Vivified
by Mariel Nightstalker
Summary: Harry Potter finds himself in an unfamiliar world with no hope of returning home. He sets out to make a name for himself and woos a gorgeous General on the way. CROSSOVER SLASH Harry/Angeal Harry/Rude Sephiroth/Harry, etc.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:** I know that I probably should be writing Don't You Want Somebody to Love before certain readers unearth my true identity and force me to, but this wanted to be written. It shan't take me long, promise! (On a side note: Never trust the promise of a scarlet woman)

This shouldn't be longer than 12 chapters, for those interested.

**Disclaimer:** I do not own the rights to either Harry Potter or Final Fantasy VII and all associated content. I make no profit from this endeavor.

**Warning: **This will contain homosexual content, swearing, and most likely violence, gore, and upsetting themes. If any of these will even mildly upset you, I don't advise you to read beyond this warning. And you do and get upset anyway, I don't really want to know about it. You should know better. Thank you.

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter One

~000~

_Vivified: to give or bring life to; animate. _

~000~

Neville's greenhouses really were spectacular. It was clear why they continued to win the award for Most Impressive Greenhouse every year. The most spectacular of the seven buildings was the relatively small Greenhouse for Rare and Experimental Plants. Shaped like an egg, it was divided into "pods" for plants with complimentary temperature and soil needs, also shaped like eggs. The sheer array of bizarre plant life was enough to take Harry's breath away, and he wasn't even much of a plant man.

He had recently been divorced by his heavily pregnant ex-wife Ginny and had thusly been spending quite a bit of time Anywhere but the Cheap Flat I Am Renting Because My Fucking Ex-Wife Took the House.

Neville was by far the least nosy of his friends, and was content to chat with Harry about whatever happened to come up as he went about his business. This was in sharp contrast to the interrogations Hermione subjected him to and the disturbing hallucinogenic fits Luna was now prone to. And of course Ron was out of the question. Since Ginny begun preparations to marry her colleague Raymond Bebberly, they had been unable to meet one another's eyes. It was one thing to pretend that some day Ginny would see all of this as a mistake and take Harry back. It was another to pretend the same when she was clearly intent on replacing Harry with the far more domesticated "Ray".

It wasn't Harry's fault that he wasn't cut out to live in a country cottage with a gaggle of children. He hadn't been raised for that kind of life and didn't know how to function when there wasn't some sort of pressing threat to his life. He didn't blame Ginny for getting fed up. He just wished that she would have divorced him _before _she asked him to help her conceive. He knew damn well she wanted his sperm to insure a more magically powerful child, and felt a bit like a prize bull.

Things hadn't exactly been all daisies and roses since the War ended. Yes, Ron and Hermione had married and seemed happy enough. Yes, most of his friends from Hogwarts that survived were now married or abroad pursuing successful careers as far from the memories of the War as possible. But there had been no closure for Harry, no sense that all was right with the world. Yes, he felt relieved now that Voldemort was finally dead, but he also felt like a middle-aged man having a crisis.

He didn't know what was missing, but he was positive that this wasn't all that life could be. He didn't want a life of getting up in the morning, taking the same uneventful route to work, seeing the same boring people every day who were somehow happier than he was, and doing some piddling chasing of petty criminals.

Half the time he wished another Dark Lord would rise again just to give him something to _do. _It would seem that, expert cook and launderer aside, Harry was not meant to be domesticated.

Harry liked Neville's greenhouses. It was like being in the jungle, only with more glass.

It was a Wednesday, early in the evening, and they were chatting about where to get take-out from. Neville's alarm buzzed, letting him know that one of his clients had fire called. He smiled apologetically at Harry and dashed to answer it. Harry watched him go and then, left alone, wandered amongst the pods looking at the plants. He never tired of looking at the plants.

In a tiny pod tucked into a corner he spotted something he must have missed before. Last he remembered the pod had been empty. Now it contained a tiny pot with a tiny plant curling fern-like inside of it.

The pod was partially open, so Harry leaned close to get a closer look at the miniature plant. It was no bigger than his thumb, a pale green in color with blue veins. He thought he saw something move and leaned a little closer, taking off his glasses and squinting.

The plant shot out a concentrated cloud of pollen without warning.

Harry, surprised, inhaled. He began to choke, feeling like he had just swallowed a handful of sand. He reached out to grip the metal railing, missed, and swooned. His head felt full of smoke and his muscles didn't want to respond. He was vacantly aware that Neville had returned and was kneeling beside him, modified cell phone in one hand, yelling at what sounded like a representative of St. Mungo's. he hung up, and asked Harry,

"Harry? Harry, what happened?"

But Harry couldn't speak, and suddenly his body wasn't his body anymore. He was made of ether, made of clouds, and he had no place being solid. He felt himself vaporize mustered a faint smile for Neville before he slipped away.

~000~

Neville called the Department of Mysteries.

Harry Potter had activated what they suspected to be the mythical World Flower. Shortly after inhaling its pollen Harry Potter had vanished into thin air, and his magical signature no longer appeared on any of the international sensors. The plant had withered immediately after releasing the pollen at its chosen victim, and the soil and pot containing it had turned to dust.

There was an uproar.

~000~

End Chapter One

Let me know what you think so far.


	2. Chapter 2

Author's Note: Thank you so much for all the feedback! I wasn't expecting such an intense response so soon. I'm excited to see where this story takes me!

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter Two

~000~

A Mandala was painted on the ceiling. This was the first thing Harry noticed upon waking. The second thing he noticed was that, although he wasn't wearing his glasses, he wasn't having any trouble seeing. He frowned, trying to work out why that would be. And then he realized that he didn't know where he was. The last time he'd checked, he didn't know anyone with a Mandala ceiling mural. He tried to remember what he'd been doing before he decided to lay down on a stone floor for a nap.

He was in Neville's greenhouse, looking at a plant, and then-

He sat up with a sharp inhale and found himself surrounded by a circle of kneeling monks. Or at least he was fairly certain that they were monks. They had shaved heads and wore robes of blue fabric with black prayer beads hanging from their belts.

When did he travel to Asia?

Their leader, a man wearing a slightly more complex robe of blue with a green sash rather than a white one approached and held out his hands with a serene smile on his face. And then he said a word Harry didn't recognize as any language he'd ever heard before.

"Sorry? Look, what is this place and who are these people, and what am I doing here?" Panic was starting to set in. he began reaching for where he'd strapped his wand to his calf.

The priest repeated himself, waving his hands in a soothing way and smiling broader. He then said a whole bunch of words together and Harry gave up on understanding what he was saying. He pulled out his wand and cast a translation spell. Most monk orders were aware of magic, and if this happened to be one of the ones left in the dark, he could just obliviate them. The Ministry had given him permission to obliviate (and kill) as he saw necessary.

Nothing happened. He tried the spell again and got the same result. He eyed his wand critically. It looked normal enough, but now that he paid attention, he realized that he could no longer feel the usual warm throb that he felt when he practiced magic with it.

What was going on?

The priest helped him to his feet and Harry put his wand away for later, praying that he wasn't about to be sacrificed to some ancient god.

Instead he was taken to a small cell and gestured at to wait there. He waited and tried to make his wand work again. He felt fine, and when he concentrated he could hear the hum of his magical aura in his ears. There must be something close by inhibiting his wand, he theorized.

The cell contained a simple pallet and a wooden box in the corner about the size of a kitchen sink. He opened it and found that it contained scrolls. He looked around and, confident he was still alone, carefully unrolled one of the newer-looking ones. It was written in complex characters that were definitely Asiatic but not of any subcategory he recognized. Where _was _he?

The priest returned with a pair of monks carrying a large bronze tub between them. Harry quickly returned the scroll but the priest didn't seem to mind that he'd snooped.

The priest waited with Harry while the others left. He took Harry's hands and looked them over with a critical eye. He smacked his lips and winked at Harry, apparently satisfied by what he saw. The monks returned with two others, each carrying a large pitcher filled with steaming water. They filled the tub and then dropped in some herbs taken from bags hanging from their waists. The monks bowed and left. The priest bowed to him, indicated the tub, and followed the others.

The priest closed the door behind him and Harry was left alone.

He dithered for a moment and then resolutely took off his clothes and got into the bath. It was obviously for him, so he'd best make use of it. It was scalding hot; the herbs made his head hum and his nerves sing. He bit his lip to keep his magic calm. It was just a bath, he reassured himself.

The priest returned, bowed, and laid a set of un-dyed white robes on the pallet. Harry blushed but inclined his head when the priest bowed.

He soaked in the bath until the water cooled and then stepped out and dried off with a small square of cloth folded on top of the robes. He then lifted the robes and frowned. How was he supposed to put this on? He sifted through the folds of fabric until he realized that there was a sort of under-robe, a long nightshirt. He pulled it over his head. He wondered if he should put his underwear on, and decided against it. For all he knew, that would be considered rude.

He did his best to remember the way the others wore their robes and tried to replicate it with the longer piece of fabric. The shorter one went around his waist, he deduced.

Thankfully the priest returned before he could completely bungle it, and smiled broadly when he saw Harry's predicament. He removed both outer garments and then held up the larger one. He said a word that sounded like a combination of "bird" and "beard". Harry assumed that was what it was called. The smaller one was held up and referred to as a "sing". Harry nodded. The priest then showed him how to loop the larger one around both shoulders and arrange it for optimal warmth and maneuverability. He then demonstrated the appropriate way to wrap and tuck the sash so that both ends were hidden and it was securely around his waist.

The robes were very comfortable. Harry copied the priest and bowed, but the priest waved his hands and shook his head. He pointed to Harry and inclined his head just the barest bit. Harry copied him. The priest nodded and said a word Harry decided meant approval.

They walked together back to the room where he'd awakened. He paid note to the undecorated stone walls that signified the outer edge and simple white screens that separated rooms from one another. This time he noticed that the room he'd arrived in, the only circular one he'd seen so far, was papered with a floral design.

He looked closer when he noticed that it was a depiction of a familiar green blue-veined fern. When he was sure that it was the same plant, he looked at the priest. The priest pointed at the floor. Harry looked. It was a mural of a sexless figure passing from one sphere to another, the fern surrounding it and painted into the border of the mural.

"Oh."

This was not good.

~000~

It took him several months to learn enough of the language to have a decent conversation with the head priest.

While he was learning, he served with the other monks in gardening, washing and weaving the fabric for their robes and other textiles, and doing a sort of physical training that utilized a lot of flexibility and minimal movements. The monastery was self-sufficient and produced everything they used in their daily lives.

The other monks prayed to their deity at sunrise and sundown, but he wasn't required to join them. He considered it disrespectful to attend religious events without sincerity.

It wasn't a bad life. He went to bed after dark and rose with the sun. He'd never gotten so much sleep in his life. The food wasn't bad either. It was dominated by rice and whatever vegetation was in season. The monastery was close to a large body of water, so they also ate a lot of seaweed and fish. There was a small village with a population of maybe 500 not far from the monastery, and the priest allowed Harry to accompany him when he visited it to heal their sick and attend their dying.

It was on one of their trips to the village, packets of herbs tied to their backs, when they discussed how Harry came to be there.

Kazuo, the priest, explained that Harry was not the first person to be dropped into their world by the World Flower. The World Flower was what they called the fern. Apparently the pollen was released from a bloom that appeared for only a second before withering.

"How many others have there been?"

"Only two have arrived," Kazuo held up two fingers, "and two were taken from us, but very long ago. You were a surprise. We had thought that the balance was even, two for two. Our monastery was built by the first man to appear here. He wished to give thanks to the Goddess for saving him. According to legend, his planet was dying and he was the last man alive when the World Flower brought him here. His body was broken in many places, but on the journey the Flower healed him. The World Flower saved his life."

Harry chewed his lip, mulling this over. That would explain why his eyes were clearer than they'd ever been and why the phantom pain he sometimes got in his forehead hadn't reappeared since his arrival. He had gradually come to realize that he was not in Asia after all but in a different world, and possibly a different time as well. How this came to be was something his mind could not fully comprehend. Whenever he'd asked, Kazuo said only that the World Flower put people where they were supposed to be.

"Have any of them ever gone back? I mean, I didn't come from a dying planet. I was unhappy, but I wasn't dying."

Kazuo smiled and lay his hand on Harry's shoulder, saying, "There are many ways to die. The spirit can wither inside a strong man and leave him a ghost, or a life of drudgery can destroy a bright mind. Whatever the reason, this is where you belong. You cannot reject the gift of the World Flower, only thank her and do your best to live the life you are meant to lead."

Harry sighed. They walked in silence, both lost in thought, for a long while. It was a several-mile walk to the village through forest. The path had been paved with smooth stones by the monks centuries before. It was a road pilgrims often took to visit the monastery, which was considered a shrine to the goddess of Fortune.

"Kazuo, how do I know what life I am supposed to lead?"

Kazuo shrugged. That wasn't comforting.

"How should I know? It is your life, you silly boy. You are young and strong. Perhaps you are meant to be a warrior? You have already made much progress with our masters. You learn quickly and move faster even than that, like a serpent. Think about this: do you enjoy fighting, or would you prefer a quiet life?"

Harry opened his mouth to answer but Kazuo held up his hand.

"Do not answer now. Meditate about it. Winter is coming soon; when springtime comes you can make your choice. You can stay at the monastery and live the life of a holy scholar, or you may leave to explore the world as you see fit."

Harry nodded to show that he understood. They did not speak for the remainder of their walk.

~000~

That day in the village Harry was sent to the river to fill a pair of pots with water for boiling herbs. It was a still, cold day, and the trees seemed like statues bordering the slow-flowing river. He knelt and set about undoing the cover on the first jar to fill it.

He heard a soft rustle behind him and turned, automatically tensing for a fight. A young man from the village smiled at him and knelt nearby, unloading a large pot from his back to fill. They worked without speaking but stole glances at one another. Harry couldn't help but notice that the young man had very regular, harmonious features. He was the handsomest man Harry had seen outside of a magazine.

Harry finished first. He noticed the young man was struggling to heft the jar onto his back. He left his jars on the ground and assisted him. The young man smiled and said in a soft husky voice a thank you. Harry smiled and turned to go.

"Wait! You are the stranger from the monastery, right?"

Harry didn't realize that the villagers had been gossiping about him, but he supposed that he should have expected something like it because of his appearance and sudden presence among them.

"I am. My name is Harry. It's nice to meet you."

The man smiled again, "It is nice to meet you too. My name is Ayu. Are you going back to the village?"

Harry nodded.

"Shall we walk together? It is nearly wolf season. It is safer to walk with others than alone."

"Alright, sure. I didn't know that you had wolves in this area."

Ayu waited for Harry to heft his pots before answering, "They are not native. Thirty years ago the king of Nibel gifted our last Emperor with a trio of wolves for his birthday. It was a very rare and expensive gift, and the Emperor was flattered. Unfortunately the wolves were much cleverer than the Emperor thought and they soon escaped their cages. The wolves escaped into the wild and their numbers have grown rapidly in the years since. Their population was stunted a little bit during the War, but they breed quickly."

"Oh."

Harry then realized something Ayu said.

"Wait, what war?"

Ayu looked at him strangely, "What do you mean? The ShinRa War. They call it the Wutai War on the mainland, but here we know who struck first. Where did you come from, where you have not heard of this war?"

Harry shrugged and laughed uneasily, "I'm sorry, I am tired. I did not think. Of course you meant the ShinRa War."

Ayu laughed as well, "Do the monks keep you too busy to sleep in their quarters?"

They chatted as they made their way to the village. Harry learned that Ayu was one of the village's warriors, or monster killers, and that he was unmarried and lived with his aged mother. Their paths diverged eventually, but Harry was happy to make a new friend and reluctant to part ways with Ayu. He decided to accompany Kazuo tomorrow as well, and asked Ayu if they could speak some more. Ayu seemed pleased with the idea and promised to meet him by the river the next day.

~000~

Kazuo didn't mind Harry coming with him again. His only other regular companion was Brother Mimoru, and Brother Mimoru believed passionately in debating one's religion to prove that one was devoted to it. Kazuo once enjoyed this, but as he grew older his ardor for argument faded. Now Mimoru only made him tired. When Harry told him that he had made a new friend, Kazuo said that he was glad that Harry was speaking to people outside the monastery, as long as he kept the World Flower a secret. He said that speaking to the villagers and making friends with them would help Harry decide his future.

Harry was a few minutes late to the meeting at the river, and was relieved when he saw that Ayu hadn't lost patience and left. He stepped on a twig which snapped, catching Ayu's attention before he could greet him. Ayu

His whole face lit up when he saw Harry. It was a marvelous smile, as if he had just come out into a bright opening after a long walk in a deep wood.

"Hello, Harry! I am so glad you have come. Here, I saved some lunch for you."

They talked about Ayu's family first. Ayu's father had been killed in the ShinRa War when Ayu was too young to make a living. His older brothers left to become soldiers, and sent as much of their wages as they could spare home to support their mother. But even with his brother's wages they were poor. Ayu was very bitter about the way the War had driven his mother into destitution and menial demeaning work. He now earned a good living protecting the surrounding villages, but the memory of his childhood still caused him pain. Ayu also talked about some of the common types of monsters that plagued the area, and the tricks he'd learned about fighting them.

Ayu then asked Harry about his background. Harry had no choice but to lie. He had learned a little geography from Kazuo, and was able to say that he was from Kalm and that his parents were killed when he was very young by a crazed murderer. He lied about going to school, becoming a clerk, and deciding that he wanted to take a spiritual journey to the Temple of Fortune. It was a plausible lie, and Ayu seemed to believe him.

"So we are alike in a way," Ayu said, twisting a piece of grass between his fingers. He was not a large man, shorter even than Harry who was by no means tall. Small though he was, he had hands like wood and moved more like an animal than a man. Harry was fascinated. "We both grew up without normal parents. I cannot understand you as a clerk though. I understand why you came here. That job would not suit you."

Harry was intrigued, "Why not?"

Ayu smiled, looking a little nervous. Harry guessed it was because they had passed from simple chatting into something more familiar. "Why don't we go on a walk? I can show you where the wolves nested last year."

Harry agreed.

As they walked, Ayu hesitantly said, "I do not mean to be too personal too quickly; we do not know each other very well yet. Please tell me if I am rude."

Harry found their social rules stifling formal as it was, but he diplomatically kept that to himself in favor of reassuring Ayu that he considered them friends already, and that he was very happy to hear his thoughts whatever they might be.

"I just see you as more like me. I once tried to weave wool for a living for a shepherd, if you can believe. I was very good, but I was not happy. I need to be free, to move around and do as I please. Right now, the only thing required of me is to draw water for my mother and feed her when she is hungry. That is all. I need this freedom or I feel like I am choking. Am I wrong to think that you are the same way?"

It took a moment for Harry to get his voice to work again. Somehow Ayu had seen right through him in such a short time. Was he really so obvious, or perhaps his old friends had been blind? Now that he thought about it, he was not worried or sad to be apart from them. He hoped that Neville was not blamed for his disappearance, and wished that he could have seen Luna's wedding to that Scamander prick, but that was all.

"No, I don't think that you are wrong. You are exactly right."

Ayu nodded and said nothing.

Ayu showed him different sets of monster tracks, where they liked to roost for the night and when they liked to breed. Harry learned more about monsters that afternoon than he had in his life. When the sun began to descend, they returned to the village. Harry returned to Kazuo for the long walk home, but Kazuo said that a man was very sick and required their presence for a few days. There was no room for Harry in the sick man's house.

Harry was about to risk returning home on foot alone when Ayu spoke up and said that he would be happy to host Harry that evening.

~000~

Ayu's mother was very old, and she fell asleep shortly after consuming the dinner of mashed fruit and rice that Ayu prepared for her. she looked like a spider, curled up in her quilts.

They stayed up talking by the window of Ayu's small cottage. It was a one-room affair with a W.C. attached that could only be accessed from outside. It was very rustic, but it met their needs.

The light gradually faded. Ayu turned on the lamp and they continued talking.

When they tired, Harry found himself sharing the quilts with Ayu. For reasons he couldn't understand, he felt no anxiety about this. There was something about Ayu that drew him in. He liked the idea of sleeping next to him, though he could have done without his mother wheezing through her nose in the background.

Ayu whispered an old goblin story about a boy that drew cats that killed a monster to Harry in the dark. Harry felt charmed and wished that he could lie closer to Ayu than they already were, even though they were so close that their breath mingled.

The feeling only intensified over the next few days until it was time to return. Harry didn't question it. Being around Ayu made him want to question himself less and just move in the direction that life urged him in. Letting go and leaving things be brought a sense of serenity that he had never before experienced.

~000~

Harry returned to the monastery and immediately headed to the library after he finished the day's chores and training. He needed to understand more about this world if he was going to live in it. The thought of living in the monastery was appealing because he was very fond of the brothers and Kazuo, but the outer world pulled at him. At the very least, he thought that fighting beside Ayu would be a good way to live.

He first focused on geography and discovering the basic facts about the different continents and major cities inside of them.

He soon realized that a company called ShinRa was the dominant power in this world. They started out simply enough as an electrical company, but the discovery of Mako as a more diverse source of power boosted them so far beyond their competitors that they soon developed a monopoly over the market. Within five years of its discovery, the entire Planet was dependent on Mako, and as its inventor, ShinRa was the only source. A subsequent investment in the fields of sawmills, mines, steel, metals, and textiles also helped grow their influence from a simple electrical company to a juggernaut of power.

This development had completely changed the history of this world. Before it was largely an agricultural world, with many rural areas still practicing hunter-gatherer lifestyles. With the widespread use of Mako, mass industrialization occurred rapidly and with many unfortunate side effects. A huge gap sprang up between those who could afford more opulent lifestyles in the first place and those who were given no opportunity to do so.

The world was under the control of a dictatorship, a dictatorship in which the people had no political voice or opportunity to better themselves. If you were born poor, you died as such. It was a depressing image made worse by the fact that, before ShinRa aggressively expanded to control everything, democracy had begun to flower and trade unions were forming. All of that was destroyed by ShinRa in a matter of months, replaced by a dependency on Mako that crippled rich and poor alike.

Harry felt what Hermione called his 'Saving People Thing' swell with righteous indignation of the behalf of this Planet.

After covering history and learning everything the library had on recent history (which was very little), he decided that whatever reason the World Flower had brought him here for had something to do with ShinRa. There was no question of that.

~000~

He found time to visit the village at least once a week with Kazuo or to help the brothers run errands. Autumn was dying and becoming winter, and fierce winds blew in from the ocean. Their diet shifted to tubers and dried fruit.

He helped Ayu fortify the cottages in the village for winter and even accompanied him on a terrifying monster hunt. They only encountered a harmless bear, but the thrill the hunt gave Harry convinced him that a passive life was not the life for him.

When it was especially cold, he would spend the night in the village with Ayu and head back at midday the next day, when the sun was high and it was warmer. They slept together on the pallet and Ayu told him stories. Sometimes he would ask Harry to tell a story, so Harry would tell him a Grimm fairytale or a carefully re-worded memory from his first exciting years at Hogwarts before things got so dark.

They drew closer. Ayu understood him so well even though there were so many things he didn't know about Harry, and Harry found himself thinking about Ayu when he was supposed to be meditating or reading the scrolls in the library, useless as they usually were about anything earlier than 200 years ago.

Ayu's mother had been fed and her wheezing played a duet with the wind whistling outside.

The early winter night fell around them in complete darkness. There was no moon tonight. They could not see each other. Harry could feel his presence strongly, though, even in the darkness. It was strange to feel Ayu so near but not to be able to see him. They were sitting in the nest of blankets already to conserve warmth. It was wasteful to keep a fire burning when there were blankets nearby.

Ayu had been telling him a story about a sea dragon he once saw as a young boy, but he seemed to catch the same heady feeling Harry had and his voice faded away.

Harry put his hand out to find his. His wandering hand met Ayu's face, his fingers catching against his lips. He thrilled inside. He tried to take his hand away, not wanting to upset Ayu or make him uncomfortable. But Ayu caught his wrist and used his grip to pull Harry closer. Harry's heart began to pound. He did not know what was about to happen for sure, but he hoped that Ayu felt the same way he did.

Ayu's lips touched Harry's cheek and then his jaw. His hard hands moved to grip his shoulders and hold him close, even though Harry showed no signs of struggling. It was so unlike the kisses he'd shared with Ginny and Cho. The kisses weren't invasive, but they showed no signs of hesitation or coyness. Harry discovered that he loved the weight of Ayu lying on top of him and the scrape of his stubble against his cheeks.

They were quiet so as not to wake his mother, but the next morning it was obvious that things had changed between them.

Ayu kissed him until he didn't have any breath left in his lungs before he let him leave the house.

~000~

The first snow came, and Harry knew that the days when he could safely travel between the monastery and the village to see Ayu were ending.

Ayu also realized this, because that night after they had had dinner and Ayu's mother was asleep, he lit and fire and almost shyly tugged on Harry's fur coat, meeting his eyes. Harry saw what he was trying to communicate and submitted. He helped Ayu undress him and then helped Ayu out of his own boots and many layers of warmth.

There were a few moments of clumsiness when Harry's inexperience came through, but Ayu was amused rather than irritated and kissed Harry to stifle any apologies he tried to make. The sensation of their connected bodies moved together was so new and painful and fantastic that Harry, when he was capable of thought, prayed that it would never end.

The fire died sometime during their lovemaking without either of them noticing the lack of its warmth. When they had finished they lay for a long time in each others arms exchanging kisses and quiet words. It was very unlike the times when Ginny either cried or insisted that he tell her why he loved her after they made love.

While they lay dozing wrapped around each other and under the protection of the covers, Harry stroked the uninterrupted curve of Ayu's back, his thumb tracing his spine from the knuckle-like bones at the nape of his neck to the strangely prominent coccyx, and wondered how he could have lived without loving a man like this before.

~000~

In the bare boughs of the trees in the yard, the wind would give a short, wordless moan now and then.

With no other option, Harry forced himself to seriously consider staying at the monastery or living in the wider world. In order to get to the root of why he had been brought here, he pondered his past. They say that hindsight is always 20-20, and Harry had to believe that when he realized one morning that he had had a crush on Cedric Diggory. That revelation caused him to seriously think about the war, and how it had changed him.

The war ended the way it'd started, suddenly and quietly.

After the war Harry had closed himself up in his house, Grimmauld Place, for over a year, spending each day on the sofa, looking at the garden, as if trying to recoup all the peace and quiet that he had missed in his life thus far. Hardly eating, he slept for ten hours a day.

When that year ended it was as though he woke up from a long nap. He studied for his NEWTS, did alright, and entered the Auror training program. Ron had already joined months ago, so they were separate, but he reconnected with the Weasleys by visiting every Sunday for a meal and some Quidditch.

Ginny had reinitiated romance between them. Looking back, Harry didn't know why he had gone along with it. He hadn't been particularly attracted to her. Maybe it was because being with Ginny was the safe option? Safe; we do so much to feel safe, and cozy, and snug. But Harry's reluctance to settle down with Ginny was a pretty clear sign that he wasn't keen on feeling safe. He wanted to explore, to do things, and to face the consequences of following his impulses. Was that so wrong?

Outside, the sky was closing overhead and the winter evening was beginning. He had made his decision. He was going to leave this place

Now all he had to do was decide if he wanted to stay in the village or try to convince Ayu to come with him into the wider world. He wanted to see deserts and mountains and Midgar. Besides, heaven only knew that living in this cramped village was a waste for a man of Ayu's talents and intelligence.

The only obstacle was Ayu's mother. Harry didn't want to be heartless, but she was the only thing standing between Ayu and a global career.

~000~

As the snow began to thaw, Harry ventured out with the monks to hunt the monsters while they were still weak from the winter's lighter diet.

The thrill of the kill, as they called it, ignited his veins. He felt alive and more secure in his determination to live the life of a warrior. He discovered that he had a natural talent. He was stealthy and quick and clever, and those skills allowed him to fight and win battles against creatures much stronger than him.

The other monks began to see him in a new way, and he noticed a subtle sort of respect that he hadn't seen from them before. Before he had been sort of like a rare bird, a nice person that worked with them but wasn't like them. Now he was a hero.

He fought with Ayu a few times when green buds began to appear on the trees. They moved well together but better apart, so they decided to keep that part of their lives separate.

Between the two of them they drove back the wolves so far that it would take many winters for them to venture close again. Harry longed to pursue the wolves further than that, to drive them out of Wutai completely, but his relationship with Ayu held him back. Their pelts sold well to a merchant they met in the nearby port town with a name Harry couldn't pronounce try as he might. The merchant stared at Harry strangely. It was a while before Harry realized it was because of his Western features. There were no mirrors in the village or the monastery, so he frequently forgot that he didn't look like everyone else.

~000~

Harry explained to Kazuo that he was going to live with Ayu in the village so that he could better fight monsters. Kazuo was saddened to see him go, but bowed and blessed him with, "May the life you lead be a good one, a life free of regrets."

Harry inclined his head and left. He did not try to embrace Kazuo. It would be inappropriate to touch the priest.

It was hard to believe that he had already been in this new world for more than a half a year. He now thought in the Wutain language and lived with Wutains and followed their customs. He killed monsters he once thought existed only in nightmares and the minds of the demented, and with a sword forged by a village blacksmith alongside pots and pans. It was so strange from an outsider's perspective, but to him it was now as natural as breathing. What other choice did he have? This was his home now, this new world.

~000~

They skinned the monsters they killed or took their teeth and horns to sell in the port towns to the merchants. One day they found and killed a giant lizard. It wasn't a dragon, but its skin was only slightly less valuable. Ayu said that they would need to visit the nearest city to find a merchant who could afford it. There was no question that Harry would accompany him even though Ayu had always gone alone before Harry came to live with him.

His mother was left in the care of a monk who had business in the village with those planting seeds blessing their crops.

In comparison to say, London, the city was tiny. But it was the largest place Harry had been in months and months, and he felt a little overwhelmed by the sights and sounds and smells. It was a chaotic place, filled with milling animals and peddlers. They camped outside the city.

The merchant they wanted was tucked away in the crux between two alleys. They carried the skin rolled up in a woolen tube to disguise it as a rug. It was very valuable and they didn't want it to be stolen.

Harry let Ayu do the talking because the merchant spoke Common, a language Harry only had a shaky understanding of, but flexed his now-impressive muscles when the merchant, who was taller than Ayu, looked like he wasn't going to cooperate. He resolved to learn more Common as soon as possible.

Later while they were eating some spiced meat on skewers that Ayu had bought from a stall, Harry picked up a newspaper and began flipping through it. He saw on one of the pages a huge advertisement for something called SOLDIER. The ShinRa logo was blazoned in bloody red in the lower right corner, so he supposed that it was an advertisement to join ShinRa's military.

The advertisement didn't matter to him. What caught his attention was the man pictured in the advertisement. He was beautiful, there was no question. He had the face of an angel and wore a dark uniform with a weapon of some kind strapped to his back. Though the picture was in black and white, the intensity of the man's gaze pierced straight through the paper. Harry felt almost uncomfortable.

His desire to do something about ShinRa had been put on the back burner, but the advertisement brought it to the surface again with new urgency. Perhaps this army was the best way to infiltrate their company.

He resolved to speak to Ayu as soon as they returned.

~000~

Ayu's mother had died in their absence. Ayu did not appear to be prostrate with misery. He was upset that he was not there for her final words, which had been a blessing upon his head, but she had been fading for many years and her passing did not come as a surprise.

Harry didn't wish to be insensitive, so he waited a month before he asked Ayu about moving away with him to Midgar. Ayu did not respond well. For the first time since they'd met, he appeared genuinely angry. Harry tried to apologize, unsure what part of his request had upset Ayu most.

"Ayu, I didn't mean to hurt your feelings or make you angry..."

"Then why are you talking to me in this shameful way?" he demanded, hands balled up in fists in his lap. Harry waved his hands, at a loss of what to say. Ayu looked away. "I don't think that we understand each other anymore, Harry. Maybe you should go."

Harry reached out to touch him. Ayu flinched away, still refusing to look at him.

"Alright, if that's what you want. I'll go."

Harry stood to leave. Suddenly Ayu burst out,

"Why don't you go already? No, don't go. Stay. No- go!"

Even more confused now than he had been a moment ago, Harry left. Outside on the muddy grass, he suddenly felt lonely and uncertain. Was he prepared to go out into this new world alone?

~000~

There was nothing wrong with Arsinoe Vicissitude. In fact, genetically speaking, she was perfect. But Sephiroth, try as he might, couldn't find it in himself the desire to mate with her and presumably produce offspring. And producing offspring was the reason they currently stood across from one another in a rented hotel room, avoiding one another's eyes.

Arsinoe was being paid a huge sum of money to let herself be used as a womb for developing Sephiroth's children, and for keeping her mouth shut about it.

Sephiroth excused himself to the restroom and was extremely grateful that he'd asked Genesis for some kind of insurance in case of nerves. That it wasn't actually nerves but the fact that he found her high voice and soft hands unappealing was not important. He could worry about that later.

Two pills later he returned and courteously told her that he would let her set the pace.

He found himself regretting that when he found himself eating room service for a full hour before she finally said, "Fuck it," and leaned over to kiss him. Her lips felt strange against him, as did the rest of her. She was squishy in certain places and that made something inside of him squeal and shy away.

He bore it admirably and performed reasonably well. From the satisfied smirk on her face, she hadn't found the experience as unpleasant as he had.

Sephiroth got dressed and left, lying through his teeth about an urgent early-morning meeting. She let him go and said that she would contact the labs when she had ascertained whether or not he succeeded in impregnating her. He nodded curtly.

In his apartment he undressed, showered briskly, and the prepared for bed. He couldn't sleep. His body felt strange; tense and loose at once. In desperation he grabbed a stack of irritating monthly reports that weren't due until the next week and sat out on his patio to fill them out. He rarely used his patio. It wasn't very large and contained only a utilitarian set of steel chairs and a small table between them with a built-in ashtray. Sephiroth didn't smoke; he wasn't allowed to smoke.

He found it difficult to focus on the reports and finally gave up. He put them back into their folders with a sigh and let his posture relax. He only dared to slouch when he really felt the need to; somehow Hojo could always tell.

For a while he sat there gazing at the moon, a slim white crescent of a moon that looked as if someone had just finished sharpening it. That such a thing could actually go on floating in the sky seemed almost miraculous.

Almost against his will, he started to think about his life, what it had become. He thought about what his life had made him become. What kind of person was he? He bowed to superior authority without question, and he trampled those beneath him without hesitation. He wasn't allowed to pick his own food, sit how he wanted to, or even select his own sexual partners.

When was the last time he'd stopped and thought about the kind of life he was living? Every day, when he wasn't on a mission, he did the same sorts of things. There were no surprises. Things followed an ordered pattern, like his steady diet of vegetables, grains, and protein. He couldn't remember the last time he'd been allowed to eat fruit, much less sugar or caffeine.

It was cold up here, above the Plate's suffocating influence. He pulled up his feet, bent his knees, and rested his chin on his hands.

Did he have any right to wish for a different life? Lots of people had the choice to do whatever they wanted but didn't. Maybe the life he led was the best life for him, the best he could hope for. Maybe he should be grateful that he even had something as occasionally exciting as missions in his life.

Regardless of what he should have been, whenever he stopped and thought about his life, Sephiroth realized that he was not happy. His work was not fulfilling and he had been growing distant from his friends ever since they were given clearance to take on protégés. It wasn't that he was jealous. They just seemed to have less in common these days. It didn't help that Genesis had started sleeping with Clovis, his current trainee. Angeal considered it unethical and frequently fought with Genesis about it. Sephiroth didn't know what to say. Clovis was of age and willing, but Angeal claimed that sex brought distracting emotions to the fore that had no place in a mentor-student relationship.

Sephiroth's emotional development was a hot source of debate in the labs, so he bowed out of the argument on that ground. How he give an opinion when he couldn't understand what his friends were feeling?

His thoughts were tied up in knots, but suddenly exhaustion came to him. He stumbled inside, locked his patio, and dropped into bed. He fell fast asleep, and dreamed of a fern opening and swallowing him up.

~000~

End Chapter One


	3. Chapter 3

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter Three

~000~

The decision to leave the village was a hard one to go through with, but Ayu's continued cold behavior after a week convinced Harry that it was the best option.

He decided to follow his original plan of pursuing the Nibel wolves. It would be his gift to Wutai for making his entry into this world smoother than it would have been otherwise. He discovered that the wolves in warmer climates were larger but slower-moving. They still had not completely adapted to the different climate.

His arms ached at night from swinging his sword. The stretches he'd learned in the monastery helped, but they couldn't completely remove the tension in his shoulders and joints. He wished that he could use his wand, or that there was an easier way to kill monsters besides slashing them to bits before they could return the favor.

The skins and horns he sold to the villages he passed through. He sold them cheaply and used the money to buy new swords or to clothing to replace what he wore. Acidic blood from certain breeds, poisons secreted in the bodies of monsters, and too much mud caused his clothes to wear out even quicker than his swords. It was a constant struggle to remain adequately clothed.

As he moved further south, he entered a sort of bowl formed by the mountains. Inside this bowl there was an extremely humid climate that fostered a large population of insects. He found it necessary to coat his entire body with mud that had to be reapplied every few hours in order to avoid being bitten to death.

According to the map he purchased, on the other side of the far mountains was the capital city of Wutai, which was tucked between that mountain range and another, thinner one. Why they would chose to locate their capital between two mountain ranges instead of next to the sea was beyond him. The choice had been made thousands of years ago when Wutai consisted of warring city states. The mountains provided natural walls. But why they continued to keep their capital there instead of one of the many large sea-facing cities was unknown.

The bowl-shaped valley was technically uninhabited, but the villagers living in the hills warned him to beware the descendants of a mad man that once carried off a woman with him into the woods.

He assumed that was nothing more than a scary story, since the Wutain people had a lively belief in superstitious things, but it was better to be safe than sorry.

It would take him three days to pass through the bowl, and its climate was ideal for poisonous monsters of all sizes to thrive. As the first day came to a close, he was exhausted, sore in body and in spirit. There was something soul-killing about fighting tiny reptiles. He built himself a structure out of dead branches, covered it with large leaves the size of his leg, and then covered that with mud.

If he hadn't built it himself, he would have thought it was a giant dropping from some gargantuan animal.

Inside his shelter it was sweltering, but he had to make it airtight to keep out the bugs while he slept. He covered all of his skin and they lay down in a spread-eagle position to stay as cool as possible under the circumstances. His sleep was fitful and filled with strange dreams.

He awoke before dawn to a large bird delicately taking apart his hut with its long knife-like beak. It was not a monster; its eyes were serene and sane. It eyed him with curiosity before continuing its task. Harry noticed that it was eating the leaves.

He quickly reapplied his layer of protective mud before anything could bite him and carefully edged around the bird, sword ready but hidden. As he was leaving it suddenly stopped chewing and began to make a quiet hacking sound like a cat coughing up a hairball.

And then something bright green came shooting out of its beak straight at Harry. He ducked and it buried itself in the bark of the tree behind him with a 'thud!'

He turned to look at it. It looked like a large marble that glowed faintly in the shade. It took him a moment to realize that it was a piece of Materia. He looked back at the bird. The bird looked at him, slowly chewing the leaves. Harry frowned. The bird cocked its head.

He pried the Materia out with his pocket knife and weighed it in his palm. It was heavier than he was expecting, and made the faint buzz of his magic intensify. He wondered if he could use the Materia, being what he was. Materia was a very crude form of magic, and he was cautious about giving it a try. What if he amplified the spell it contained too much, or seriously injured himself?

He pocketed it and continued his trek, wary of monsters.

By that afternoon he'd killed three large monsters and skinned them. Their weight was slowing his progress and he was beginning to reconsider dragging them over the mountains. He stopped to take a break and have some water. He climbed a tree for safety and sat swinging his feet while listening to the harsh cries of the birds as they called to one another.

A perverse impulse made him take out the Materia. The monastery didn't have a lot of information on how to use Materia. He knew that they were solid chunks of Mako, and that some contained the ability to summon the minor gods to use destructively against your enemies. He wondered what type of Materia he held in his hands just then, and why that bird had swallowed it in the first place.

He wished that he could have asked Kazuo about this.

He rolled the Materia between his fingers. It was smooth and warmed quickly as he touched it. His thoughts wandered as he played with it. He was enjoying his new rustic life; he had never seen so many types of vegetation up close before, and this was only one country. It was too bad that he would have to dump the monster skins he'd gathered so that he could cross the mountains. If his wand worked, he could have easily shrunk them and the problem would be solved…

As he thought about shrinking the skins currently slung over the branch beside him, he noticed something funny begin to happen. The Materia put out a flash of warmth and then the skins began to grow smaller. It was a little slower than a normal shrinking spell, but sure enough, they were shrinking.

His lips parted as his jaw went slack. He looked at the Materia and then at the skins, then back between them again. He might not have known much about Materia, but he did know that what he'd just done should have been impossible.

For the next few hours he experimented with the Materia. He took a break to catch a small mammal to eat for dinner and to construct a shelter to sleep in. he found that simply imagining the spell he wanted while holding the Materia made it happen, sort of like using a wand that you didn't need to wave.

He tried setting the Materia close to him. The spells were initially even slower that way, but he tried again and again until he saw that they came faster with practice. It was as though his magic and the Materia were learning to work with each other.

Next, he tried putting the Materia on the other side of his hut. Sure enough, as long as he could see the Materia and visualize it, the spells continued to work. That night he slept comfortably under a cooling spell, mud-free and safe from bugs thanks to a repellent charm. He hadn't felt this happy since the night Ayu kissed him.

~000~

Using blasting spells was a very simple way to dispatch monsters. He found that every once in a while he preferred the fight the monster manually to get the thrill of it, but largely he conserved his strength. He crossed the remainder of the bowl to the foothills of the mountains before noon.

He didn't want to risk Apparatating, but he did cast a multitude of cushioning spells on himself before he began to climb in preparation for the sheer cliffs higher up. He had no rope and no safety nets other than his magic.

He climbed quickly and only encountered a few goats on his way. They ignored him and he ignored them. He didn't want to be rammed off the cliff by a peevish animal anymore than they wanted to be irritated by an out-of-place human.

At the very top of the mountain, he looked down and saw the capital city below him. It wasn't much bigger than the city he'd visited with Ayu to sell their lizard skin, but even from way up high he could tell that it was very ancient and very beautiful.

As he descended, he would occasionally take breaks and gaze at it. It was like a city inside a snow globe, perfectly proportioned and colorful like a child's toy. Unlike the newer monastery which was constructed with undecorated stones found locally, the city was largely made of brightly-painted wood. Some of the columns were so thick and tall that he could hardly imagine trees big enough to supply them. As he drew closer they only seemed bigger.

The city was walled with regularly-spaced entrances. Now that he was closer some of the magic that held from a distance disappeared. It looked more like a foreigner's concept of Wutai than Wutai. Everywhere there were signs in Common directing tourists to different monuments, themed restaurants, and cheap hotels. The guard at the gate didn't even try to stop him. He only looked at his Western features, plastered on a false smile, and wished him a pleasant vacation.

Harry had heard that Wutai's economy was not good, and that since the war with ShinRa they had become more reliant on tourism. He was not expecting the damage to the country's pride to be so profound.

The people manning different stalls in the marketplace looked defeated behind their business. He was thoroughly depressed by the time he finished selling his many, many skins to the merchants. They could not believe the quality and quantity of them. Thanks to cleaning and cutting spells, he was able to carefully remove the entire skin and make sure that any damage done to it while he was fighting it was repaired.

He just smiled and bowed at their compliments, and drove a hard bargain.

By the time he had sold everything, he was a very rich man. He noticed a group of young women sloppily dressed in cheap kimonos eyeing him from the corner. He avoided their corner. He did not wish to acquire a venereal disease at this stage in the game, thank you very much.

He visited a weapons shop to look for a new sword. Surely they would have something of better quality here than in the small port cities and villages.

The shop was small and crowded. They had a selection of quality swords, but they were made for shorter men and did not feel right in his hands. He purchased a new knife, bowed to the owner, and left. The shopkeeper still looked shocked at Harry's fluent Wutain after he had completed their business transaction.

Harry wondered if it would be better to stumble his way through Common instead. He didn't want to draw attention to himself.

He visited three more weapons shops before he found a dusty sword in the back of the rack that looked about right. It was a simple undecorated broadsword with only one slot for Materia, and after a few experimental swings, he could tell that it was the right sword for him. He supposed that the reason it had not sold before was because it only had one slot instead of the common three.

The owner was surprised that he wanted to buy it, and Harry was able to argue him into a ridiculously low price. It would seem that the man was tired of looking at it.

He paused to strap the sword to his back and saw a notice taped to the front window of the shop. It caught his eye because it was the only sign written in Wutain characters rather than Common letters. He was out of practice reading them, but a head-tilt and a squint later enlightened him. It was an advertisement for able-bodied men with experience in monster killing to report to the palace if they wished to fight a pair of sea monsters for a reward. The reward was not named, but Harry didn't care.

Sea monsters! The excitement of fighting creatures so strange and so alien was enough of a reward for him. He noted the room the notice asked hopefuls to report to and set off to find a hotel for the night. It was late afternoon and he was tired from his long day; the next morning he would report and do his best to defeat the monsters.

~000~

The palace was more garishly decorated than any other building in the city, and that took an immense effort. The walls were so crowded with grotesquely-painted gargoyles that he could hardly tell where the doors were.

He told the guard at the gate his business and was admitted with an escort. The security seemed weak to him, but he decided that the Wutai had nothing to fear anymore. They were already prisoners of their mortal enemy.

His guide was silent, for which Harry was grateful. Nerves buzzed through his veins like a powerful drug. He had trouble containing himself.

The process of registering turned out to be quite bland. A portly middle-aged man shoved a clipboard at him and a set of photographs of the monsters. If he still wanted to fight them, all he had to do was write down his name and turn up at the palace with the severed heads of the monsters when he'd done the deed.

He eyed the photos. They weren't very good quality, but he could discern a pair of snake-like creatures, bright-green in color, writhing together in a cove as they fought over a buffalo that looked like a toy in their jaws.

He didn't hesitate to scribble down his name. There was no way he was walking away from a challenge like this.

~000~

The sea monsters had been decimating the aquatic life all along the southern coast, thus starving the villages dependent on fishing for their livelihood. Their presence was also hurting exports of fish and tourism, because they frightened in-bound ships. They were quite the problem.

Harry wasn't sure how to go about killing them at first. He settled on renting a small boat. The fisherman who rented it to him scoffed, saying that he would wear himself out with rowing before he could get very far at all. The fisherman didn't know that Harry intended to propel the boat with a spell so that he could focus on tracking the monsters.

"This isn't cheating, is it?" he wondered out loud, dragging his hand in the water. He had his Materia slotted into his sword, which he held in his other hand. He cast a notice-me charm and let the boat float freely. He waited.

He waited a long time as the sun slowly rose. At one point he took his hand out of the water to eat the lunch he'd packed just in case. He ate his rice and bean stew with relish, keeping an eye out for suspicious movement. As he chewed he saw a large wave in the distance. He frowned. It was a still day, and the water out here was calm.

And then he realized what that wave must be when he saw another form beside it. Smoke rose out of the water and then a head the size of a house appeared, vapor pouring off of it. The stench of it was enough to make Harry's stomach turn. He ended his notice-me spell and stood. The other monster surfaced and settled behind him. For a few minutes none of them moved. Harry was surprised. He had expected them to attack. Perhaps they had just eaten, and now were simply curious.

He grew bored and decided to experiment. He wasn't sure if his connection with the Materia was strong enough to pull off a really big spell.

He cast a Freezing spell.

The monster in front of him turned to ice. Harry frowned. It wasn't supposed to do that, but it was a start. He turned to find the monster behind him only lightly glazed with rapidly melting ice. He panicked when he saw its jaw begin to unclench and swung his sword at its neck. It was slimy and rubbery, and he had to hack at it for some time before the head came off. He quickly shrunk it, unwittingly diverting his attention from the freezing spell he was holding over the dead monster's counterpart.

He spun in time to see the maw of the monster descending. He did the only thing he could think of and thrust his sword upward in a swift motion. It lodged deep in the monster's brain, killing it.

Harry was reminded strongly of his fight with the Basilisk when he was just twelve years old.

He checked to see if he had been bitten, but was untouched. He withdrew his sword and froze the monster so that he could remove its head before it could sink into the water. He shrunk it and placed it beside its twin. Even shrunken, they were immensely heavy and terrifying. After a moment he tied them to the sides of the boat and resized them. He would have to explain himself when he reached the dock.

Before rowing back he watched their bodies sink into the water, leaving behind their foul stench and a bubbling layer of greasy blood mixed with the water. He threw up from the sight.

Back at the dock he was looked at with awe by the fishermen. They seemed afraid to touch him, much less speak to him. He asked one of them if he could purchase a truck of some kind to transport the heads. This seemed to break the spell they were under, and they rushed into action. He was bowed at by everyone and had a three different old ladies bring him necklaces made of shells. They were a sign of honor and good favor, so he accepted them gracefully and wore them around his neck to show his gratitude.

It took ten men to heave each of the heads into the large flat-bed truck. Harry was glad that there was a high lid and that someone had had the sense to line it with a tarp. The heads were still bleeding copiously.

He covered them with a dark tarp so that no one could see what he was carrying. He paid one of the fishermen, Yuki, to drive the truck. He still did not understand their gear system and didn't want to get into a car wreck out of ignorance.

When they arrived at the palace Harry once again told the guard his business and was, shockingly, admitted. It helped that the guard peeked under the tarp and quickly turned green.

Yuki agreed to wait in the truck while Harry went to have an audience with whoever was responsible for paying him.

~000~

That person turned out to be the emperor himself.

Harry decided that it must have been a slow day. After his cargo was inspected by four different experts, he was escorted to a bathing chamber. After he was clean and freshly dressed in formal robes that he was positive he had put on wrong, he was escorted to the Emperor's quarters for his reward and a medal of honor.

It wasn't bad for a few hours work.

The inner chamber of the Emperor was quite different from the garish exterior. It was painted in the traditional colors and style of Wutain royalty. The room was filled with big bowls of lilies.

The Emperor himself was a stressed-looking man in his forties. The same air of defeat that hovered around the people seemed even stronger in him. He mustered a smile for Harry, who bowed at the waist as low as he could without touching the floor. The Emperor gestured and someone melted out of the screens lining the room to present a medal on a tray to the Emperor.

"Please incline your head."

Harry complied. The medal was put around his neck, and hung heavy against his breast bone. He smiled. A sense of accomplishment poured through him. The Emperor did not smile back, but only because it was bad form for Wutain leaders to show signs of mirth when attending state business. Solemnity showed their devotion to order and to the gods.

Another gesture brought a new servant forth, this one bearing a modern briefcase. It was handed to Harry. The Emperor spoke again, this time to say,

"I hope that this reward compensates your bravery. Wutai thanks you for rescuing her from the sea serpents. May you live a blessed life."

Harry bowed again and was dismissed. Just as he was leaving, someone burst into the room (an impressive feat, considering that the door was merely a thick curtain). It was a young girl. She stared at Harry with eyes the size of saucers, and then breathlessly asked,

"Are you the man that killed the huge snakes?"

Harry, at a loss, nodded. He noticed that the attendants were bowing, so he copied their example. The girl must be a princess of some kind, he surmised. Someone murmured in Wutain that she was the Princess Yuffie, the Emperor's daughter. Harry bowed again, this time deeper.

"Oh my god you must be sooo brave!" she went on gushing almost incoherently in a mixture of Common and Wutain until Harry's head started to hurt. He wore a somewhat pained smile all through her speech. At the end of it (when she ran out of breath), he thanked her and then requested to be dismissed. He spoke very formal Wutainese, and he could tell from a sharp intake of breath somewhere in the room that those present had no expected him to speak their language.

The Emperor laid his hand on Yuffie's shoulder and told her that she must let the warrior depart and return to her lessons. She pouted for a moment but did as she was told. Harry bowed for a third time to the room at large and then got the hell out of there.

Back in his hotel room he counted his money and found it to be a substantial amount. He had made a lot of money the past two days. He wondered what he should do with it. He had no bank account to lodge it in for later, nor any documents that would qualify him to do so.

He spent the next two days as anonymously as possible while he made his decision.

The news that the sea monsters had been killed was all over the news, and although no one had been able to snap a picture of him, he decided it was better to hide his face as much as possible. He was eternally grateful that he had not given his real name to anyone. All the credit for this act of heroics was pinned on a man named Desmond.

He decided that he would take a boat to the mainland, but not to Midgar just yet. He was sitting in a bar having a quiet drink when another westerner joined him. He spoke rapidly in Common, so Harry had to explain to him that he did not speak it very well. The man was surprised but dutifully slowed down. He said that he was a merchant from the Northen Crater, and that this was the first time he'd been to Wutai.

His name was Hans, and he specialized in buying and selling monster pelts.

"I saw you sitting here, saw your sword, and knew immediately that you must be a warrior of some kind."

Harry took a swallow of beer and replied, "You are correct. I'm afraid that I don't have any skins on me right now, though. I have already sold my stock."

Hans waved a hand, "No, no, you misunderstand me. I have said that I am from the Northern Crater. It is very cold there, and very few chose to live in that place. However, there is a reactor there and so somebody must live there. Monsters also live there. It is a very wild place, and lately the snowmen that we call abominable have been growing to alarming numbers. Unfortunately, it is mostly old men and men with children who do not wish to endanger themselves unnecessarily that live there. Our young men go away to warmer places, so there is no one to fight the monsters. What I want with you is to make you an offer. You look strong enough to handle a different climate; what would you say to accompanying me back to the Crater to fight our monsters? I will buy the skins from you and even take you with me on my next boat back here to sell them. I take a boat every three months, so you see, it would be no time at all. What do you say?"

Harry felt relieved and pleased. This saved him a lot of hard choices about where to go next. As fascinating as he found it, he wanted to see other countries besides Wutai. The Northern Crater would be a huge change, but he was brave enough to see it through.

He smiled and shook hands with Hans.

"I would be very happy to come with you."

"Really? Wonderful! We set sail tomorrow at dawn."

Hans copied down all of the vital information about which boat it was and what Harry should bring with him. Then they shared another beer, this time in friendship, and parted ways for the night.

Harry made sure to set a magical alarm so that he would not miss the boat. He fell asleep feeling light-hearted and accomplished. He had already accomplished so much, and could do so much more soon.

~000~

It was very cold in the Northern Crater.

Harry supposed that he should have been expecting that, but it came as a shock just _how _cold it was. And the snow! He'd never seen so much snow in his life. Everything was frozen and white and seemed untouched by human hands. It was only the village and the Icicle Inn that had footsteps in the sheer white.

Hans paid for him to stay at the Inn at first, but as soon as Harry heard that the snowmen only came out for a few hours at dusk, he asked if he could work for his room and board. He needed to have something to do during the day or he would lose his mind.

It turned out that Hans hadn't been lying about the shortage of able-bodied men. Almost everyone worked at the Reactor, with the exception of the elderly and young mothers with small children. There were a number of repairs that needed to be made frequently because the strong winds at night often wreaked havoc. He was careful to work only for food or other consumables; it was a very small and remote place, and he didn't want to upset their delicate economy.

The innkeeper, a hard-looking man in his sixties He had the flinty pride of someone who'd worked for his bread since he was thirteen and never asked anybody for help. It was clearly a struggle for him to allow Harry to do the tasks that had now become too difficult for him. Harry tried to be sensitive to that and did the odd jobs when the innkeeper wasn't around as much as possible.

When he was out of odd jobs he worked in the kitchen utilizing the skills he learned from his Aunt Petunia and Mrs. Weasley. It was there that he first began to feel a few pangs of homesickness. Mrs. Weasley had been hurt by his divorce from Ginny. She seemed to understand that it wasn't his fault and that it would have happened eventually, but that didn't make it any easier for her to watch her child's marriage dissolve.

He did his best not to think about the past but to focus on the present and the future. This was his life now, and there was no way to turn back.

~000~

He didn't encounter a snowman until a week had passed. He patrolled the village nightly looking for them. He would have liked to go and seek them out, but he couldn't risk the village being attacked in his absence. He could never forgive himself if that happened.

He was making his usual round when he noticed something odd. There was a hill where he did not remember there being a hill before. He squinted in the slanting snow, raising his flashlight. The hill proved not to be far away but rather a snowman very close indeed. A startled yell escaped him when it suddenly reared up and tried to swipe at him with one of its giant paws. He danced out of the way at the last moment, but it tore his jacket. He quickly cast the first spell he could think of, a blasting spell, while he unsheathed his sword. The snowman went flying.

Harry pursued and managed to get in a good hit before it could retaliate. The snowman managed to hit him on the head, sending him to the ground. While his ears rang, he grabbed hold of his Materia and wished fervently for the creature's heart to stop.

It must have worked, because the snowman began to wheeze and then stumbled to the ground. Harry tried to haul the monster back himself, but it was too heavy. He returned to the village and asked for the innkeeper to help him. The man grumbled but got into his snow suit and came out with him. He communicated almost entirely in grunts, and Harry sometimes found his directions about where they should drag it hard to follow. He wished that he could have used a simple levitation spell, but he wanted to keep his magic to himself. Who knew what these people would do to him if they found out what he was capable of.

The snowman was taken to the butcher where it would be skinned and the meat salted. There were people who paid good money for salted snowman.

That night marked the beginning of a veritable onslaught of snowmen. He could see why their increased numbers were a problem. They were probably having trouble feeding everyone and resorted to trying to kill humans despite the risk. He resorted to killing them almost entirely with magic, only beheading them or something similar after the deed so that he could explain how he'd done it to the villagers. It was tiring work, but he enjoyed the variety of stars he could see at night and, perversely, the threats to his life.

He blamed his childhood for the way he'd turned out.

By the end of his second month he had succeeded in reducing their numbers a significant amount. Hans was daily praised for thinking to bring in a warrior to guard them, and Hans had begun to hint to Harry that perhaps another three months of labor wouldn't be such a bad idea. Harry refused. He wanted to see other places, and he was confident that the snowmen would be only a negligible threat by the time he'd left.

They no longer attacked the village directly. He had to go hunting for them.

~000~

One morning three weeks before the end of the contract the innkeeper approached him while he was repairing a chair that had snapped the night before. He avoided Harry's eyes but gruffly said,

"There is something wrong with the Reactor. We are expecting some important guests tonight. You will need to move out of the large room and into Mary's old quarters."

Harry nodded, "Okay. Thank you for warning me."

The man muttered something and then went back to wherever it was he hid during the day when he wasn't wanted. Harry frowned once he was out of sight. Something was wrong with the reactor? That was a bad sign. He hoped it wasn't too serious. The people here depended on that reactor for their jobs, and would have trouble relocating or finding a way to subsist here without it.

He finished fixing the chair and then went up to what they called the large room to remove his belongings. The inn was quite small. He was just happy that he would have somewhere to stay at all, even if it did mean Mary's old room. Mary was one of the cooks at the inn, but when she got pregnant she moved in with her boyfriend and got a new job at the reactor. The innkeeper, whose name Harry still didn't know, wasn't very happy about it.

When he entered the kitchen to help prepare dinner he found Tabitha, their remaining cook, in a snit like he'd never seen her before. She was flying around taking things out of cupboard and banging doors. He cleared his throat and she froze, slowly turning around. She visibly relaxed when she saw it was him.

"Oh thank goodness it's just you. I thought it was one of _them."_

"One of whom?" Harry asked, coming over and setting the pots in order. She waved her hands crazily.

"You know, one of the _SOLDIERS."_

Harry frowned, "Oh, soldiers are coming? I thought it would be repairmen."

"Not when a reactor has a problem like this one, no. There's a leak. Jenny told me so. And when there's a leak they send SOLDIERS because it makes the monsters go nuts. Even you would have a hard time taking down a Mako-crazed monster."

Harry raised his eyebrows, "Oh really? You want to bet on that?"

She snorted and smacked him upside the head, "Shut your saucy mouth and help me. You're not going out while those SOLDIERS are here anyhow, so you'd best get used to being in the kitchen with me. Those boys sure can eat, and I'll need your help keeping them supplied. Here," she handed him a sack of grain, "Go grind this up so we can get started on bread. We'll be needing lots of it."

Harry did as he was told.

Soldiers, huh? He wondered if they would be the special Mako-boosted super soldiers or regular men specially trained to handle rabid monsters. With a smile, he wondered what it would be like if they sent the beautiful man he'd seen in the advertisement for joining SOLDIER.

When he'd finished preparing the flour Tabitha put him to work making his now-famous mushroom stew. It was a recipe of Mrs. Weasley's that he remembered, and was fairly simple. They grew a lot of mushrooms up here in their basements, so any new way of cooking them was enthusiastically received.

~000~

The innkeeper lumbered into the kitchen at seven and announced that the guests had arrived. They could hear the loud roar of a helicopter overhead as he spoke. Tabitha let out a little shriek and dropped the loaf of bread she was holding. Harry smirked at her and she scowled.

"I'll let you know when they are ready to be served."

Tabitha gave a little curtsy to show that she understood. With one last sour look at Harry the man left. Harry shrieked when he felt Tabitha smack his bottom. She laughed and dusted off the bread she'd dropped.

"Serves you right."

The innkeeper returned ten minutes later and said that there were five men to feed.

Tabitha tried to serve the food, but her hands started shaking too badly. Harry asked her what the matter was and she could only gasp out that the SOLDIERS made her really nervous. He rolled his eyes and decided to serve them himself instead of having her do as they planned. What was she so nervous about?

He put five large bowls on a tray with a loaf of bread. He tucked a bottle of cider under his arm and pushed open the door leading to the general living area with his hip. A table had been set up earlier in the day with a vase of dried flowers. He didn't think that the military men would care too much about flowers, but Tabitha put her foot down so the feminine touch remained.

He plastered a polite smile on his face and approached.

There were two men wearing civilian clothes, another in a suit and sunglasses (here? And at night?), and two more…

Harry set the tray down without trembling. He uncorked the cider and served it to those that wanted it and then passed out the bowls. At the last moment he raised his eyes and allowed himself to take in the sight of the silver-haired man from the poster. He couldn't believe that he was really here. How was this possible?

He felt at once the influence of his silence and his subtle power. He swallowed.

"Do you gentlemen require anything else?"

Sephiroth looked up from the folder open in front of him and gave him a sharp once-over. His eyes glowed softly, and behind their coolness he could see a sort of melancholy. He looked like a man who had been unhappy for so long he no longer noticed it anymore. Harry was confused by his interest until he realized that his accent was quite unusual, being a mixture of English and Wutain. There were head-shakes and murmured demurs. He bowed and left.

In the kitchen Tabitha took one look at his face and said,

"Oh my god he's here isn't he?"

Harry rubbed his temples. "Who?"

"General Sephiroth! I heard that the leak was pretty bad, but I didn't know it would be bad enough for them to bring _him._"

"What does he look like?"

She gave him a funny look, "What do you mean? Where have you been living? Everyone knows General Sephiroth. He's the reason Wutai fell so fast. Before they brought him in that war was dragging along like it was on vacation. But as soon as he landed, there was hell to pay. He's an international hero, you know."

"Does he have silver hair?"

"Yes, obviously. They say it's from the stress of the war."

"Oh."

Tabitha jerked her head at the sink and left. She was going to the pantry to have a beer, but Harry pretended not to know that. Tabitha's dirty habit was her business.

As he washed dishes he thought about the man he now knew to be General Sephiroth.

He had neglected his modern history since leaving the monastery. He just hadn't had access to information or the time. He resolved to remedy. He would prefer a book with pictures this time. He had imagined General Sephiroth to be a man in his mid to late thirties with a face like a boulder. The man out there was so young! Harry wouldn't be surprised if they were almost the same age.

That would mean that he was a teenager when he fought the Wutains. His eyebrows went up. Perhaps they had a lot more in common than he'd thought. That was an interesting thought. He wondered if he was in a relationship and, if so, with what kind of person. Somehow he didn't think that he was seeing anyone. There was an air of loneliness around him. Maybe he was with someone but they didn't make him happy?

Perhaps joining the army wouldn't be the worst idea he'd ever had. He knew that he would eventually get tired of wandering around in the woods by himself and want a little more structure and companionship in his life. The army might be the answer to that. And so what if he was partially motivated by the chance to be near this General Sephiroth? Was that such a crime?

Someone knocked on the door and then opened it. Harry looked up from the dishes expectantly, soap suds up to his elbows. It was the other man from the table, a thick slab of a man who looked like he could tear down a brick building with his bare hands. His eyes were surprisingly gentle for a man of his dimensions. He looked quite nice, really. There was something attractive about him that made Harry want to trust him.

"Excuse me, but could we have another bottle of cider?"

Harry smiled and nodded, "Of course. I'll bring one out in a moment. Would you like anything else?"

"A refill on the stew? It's the best we've ever had."

"Oh, thank you!" Harry found himself blushing even as he uncorked the cider. What was wrong with him?

"You made it? Wow, you have a gift. Can I have the recipe? I live alone, and its nice to try something new every once in a while."

"Sure!" Harry handed him the cider and grabbed his tray, "I'll just serve you all some more food before I scribble it down. Is that alright?" Something about this man was making him revert to his overly-polite behavior from his early childhood.

"Yeah. Hey, I'm Angeal, and you are…?" He held out his hand, eyebrows raised.

"Harry; it's nice to meet you."

They shook hands, and Harry quivered a little from the sheer strength held back in Angeal's grip. It was like shaking hands with a civilized force of nature.

Sephiroth's eyes flicked to him when he came out to load their bowls for seconds. Harry thrilled inside but kept his exterior professional. These men were guests and he was technically the help, not their new best friend. When he returned with the bowls he handed Angeal a folded piece of paper with the recipe on it, bowed to the table, and left for the kitchen. That stack of dishes wasn't going to wash itself.

~000~

The technicians and Turk Wilcox had retired to their rooms, and Sephiroth was buried in his reports and clearly not in the mood to talk. It was a little known fact (so little known that Angeal and Genesis were the only ones in the know) that Sephiroth hated helicopters and was always a little grumpy before and after riding them. No one knew why this was, and Sephiroth wasn't going to tell them.

Angeal was left without company. Except that he wasn't. He had every intention of tracking down Harry, the handsome young man that'd waited on them. He couldn't explain it but there was something about Harry that soothed him. Besides, he at the elast wanted to find out where he was from so he could pinpoint his accent. He'd never heard anything like it.

He found him in the kitchen. Harry was by the pantry and spoke first.

"Would you like a beer?" Harry was holding a beer himself, his elbow tucked into his waist. His pale eyes were keen in the semi-light from the hearth fire. There were no electrical lights lit.

"Just water, please. I don't drink."

Harry nodded and poured him a glass. When he gave him the cup of water, his hand touched his and Angeal felt his fingertips hot and glossy against his own. He smiled.

"So, Harry, are you busy?"

Harry shook his head, "No, I was just going to go and do a little reading. But the book isn't very interesting, and I think that you would like to talk to me, wouldn't you?"

Angeal laughed a little and bit his lip before replying, "That is correct. I don't have anyone to spend the evening with, so if you'd care to join me wherever you would be most comfortable…?"

Harry touched his arm and led the way through front door into the common area. There was a sofa next to the fire, and the innkeeper's old dog Mavis was snoozing on the carpet. Harry sat cross-legged on the floor beside her and began to scratch her ears, his beer bottle in the basket formed by his legs. Angeal settled close by with his back resting against the sofa and his long legs stretched out towards the fire.

"Where are you from, Harry?"

"Kalm, but I lived in Wutai for a little over six months up until recently," at Angeal's questioning look he explained, "I was working as a clerk and it was just soul-killing. I saw this pamphlet about rediscovering your spiritual health in Wutai, so I told my boss to fuck himself and went."

"Wow."

Harry laughed, "Yeah, well, he wasn't a very nice person and I was very upset at the time. I was going through some personal problems and getting away seemed like the best idea."

"I understand. So how did you go from Wutai to here? It's kind of a hike."

Harry laughed again, "I was offered a ride, and I wanted to go somewhere new, so here I am. I work for my room and board and help fight the snowmen when it gets bad. I like it here, but I think I'll move on again soon. I've been here almost three months already, and there's still so much of the world that I haven't seen."

"You like traveling?"

"Yeah, I guess so. I didn't think about it that way, but I guess you're right," Harry smiled at him and took a sip of beer, "Oh, hey, I want to warn you that I didn't exactly do well in my current events classes, so sometimes I sound like I came from under a rock. Just be aware."

Angeal gave him a playful salute, "I understand. I hated math and failed every class I ever took in it."

They sat in silence for a few minutes, Harry stroking Mavis and Angeal watching the firelight play over Harry's features. He was very attractive, and his personality was interesting. Angeal didn't meet many people that just leapt into something new and decided to make it their own.

"Angeal, I had some questions about SOLDIER. If you don't want to talk about work I understand, and I won't be offended if you don't answer."

He shook his head, "No, I love my job. What do you want to know? Are you interested in joining the program?"

Harry shrugged, "Maybe. I know that you're enhanced, and that fascinates me, but I'm not sure I want to change my molecular structure so that I can kill monsters faster. What do they do to you, exactly?"

"You really _didn't _pay attention in Current Events, did you?" Angeal grinned when Harry turned red and looked away, "Hey, its okay. They inject us with Mako initially and then as your body's content increases, you are weaned off until you only need a monthly shower in the stuff for a minute. It's not bad, really. It depends on the person, of course. Some people have a very high tolerance for Mako, like Sephiroth, and need to be injected twice a month to keep their levels where they should be. Some people can't handle it at all, and yeah, those people die or get very sick. But that's rare, and they know how to test for that prior to the injections now, so it's no longer an issue."

Harry nodded, "It sounds complicated. Do the injections hurt?"

"I'm not going to lie to you. Yes, they do. But it's nothing in the grand scheme of things. I can't even remember what it was like before I was enhanced. So many things just got simpler after the injections. This is not to say that SOLDIER is for everyone. It's a very high-stress job, especially if you're highly-ranked."

Harry hummed, "You're highly-ranked, aren't you?"

Angeal stared at him, "Do you just not read the news at all?"

Harry looked away and muttered, "We don't get the paper here. And I'm a holy wanderer, remember? I don't exactly stop at every town for a pastry and a sit-down with the newspaper."

"I'm only teasing. Don't take it personally. Sephiroth is the General of the army, and the most highly-enhanced individual on the Planet. Next in the food chain are Genesis and I, and we're called Commanders. Sephiroth has been enhanced since infancy, and I was started on the program in my adolescence. I've had Mako in my veins for longer than I've been without it."

Harry whistled.

"Next there are the First Class, then the Seconds, then the Thirds, and then the infantry. ShinRa has a side division called Turk, which handles more delicate jobs. They only enhance their men as needed, though, instead of as part of their program. I wouldn't recommend applying for the Turks, though, unless you have a really strong stomach. They have to do everyone's dirty work. And I do mean _everyone. _That and they get drafted at the last minute to fill in gaps. Our pilot is a Turk, for instance._"_

"Oh."

"Was that everything you wanted to know?"

Harry frowned, thinking. He finished his beer and asked, "How do you advance from the infantry to the Mako stuff?"

"Advancement is decided on merit. So if you're good enough and psychologically stable, you'll get tested for your reaction to Mako. If its positive, you go into training and if you can pass the tests you get entered into Third. There are annual tests for advancement, but they are optional. Some people are happy as Thirds or Seconds, and there's no pressure to advance if you're not interested."

"That's nice."

"Yeah."

They sank back into silence. Angeal looked from the fire to Harry and found Harry already watching him. Harry looked away after a moment of eye contact.

"It's late," his voice was softer, huskier than it'd been before, "I should go."

"Do you have to?" Angeal asked, a flash of boldness motivating him to reach across and hook his pinky through Harry's. Harry colored but didn't pull away. He slipped his strong slim hand into Angeal's much-larger palm and smiled at the fire.

"No."

Angeal slowly leaned closer until his breath wafted against Harry's cheek. Harry turned to him, eyes downcast, and tightened his grip on his hand. Angeal brushed his hand through Harry's short fringe and then cupped his face. They were seated in the open but there was no one else around. Everyone sensible was in bed.

Harry kissed him. their lips had barely touched for a moment before someone pounded on the door. harry sprang back and went to answer it, taking a moment to collect himself. Angeal heard from his place on the floor that there was a huge hole in the roof of one of the storehouses and that Harry was needed immediately to come help patch it together before too much snow got in.

"Okay, just let me suit up. I'll meet you."

"Hurry, Harry!"

The door was shut. Harry walked quickly to Angeal and kissed him for a good two minutes, much to Angeal's surprise and pleasure. Then he broke away and gave him a rueful smile.

"I need to go. I'll see you tomorrow, I hope."

"Me too." Angeal pulled him close and kissed his neck, "I really enjoyed meeting you, just in case we don't see each other again."

Harry laughed breathlessly and kissed the underside of his chin, "I hope this isn't goodbye."

And then he was gone to put on his snow things and join the others outside. Angeal retired to his room and thought about Harry until he fell asleep.

~000~

End Chapter Three

Why do I sometimes feel like I am writing Robinson Crusoe?

I hope you guys liked it!


	4. Chapter 4

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter Four

~000~

Angeal woke at just before six in the morning to the soft sound of someone tapping on his door. He suspected that it was Sephiroth with some last-minute adjustments to their itinerary, so he was tempted to just ignore the tapping. Something made him get out of bed and answer the door. What if it was an emergency?

Harry stood there with two mugs of tea in his hands and a shy smile on his face.

"Did I wake you?"

"No, I was just dozing. Come inside, please," he stepped to the side so that Harry could enter. Harry brushed against him, and the scent of tea wafted under his nose.

There was nothing in the room but a bed, a nightstand, and a wardrobe against the wall. Harry sat on the bed, placing one mug on the nightstand and keeping the other between his hands. Angeal couldn't blame him; the halls weren't heated, and Harry looked cold. He sat beside him and took the other mug of tea, taking a sip. It was imported from Wutai, like most tea on the Planet. That reminded him of something that he'd been thinking about the night before. Certain aspects of Harry's story about being from Kalm and then suddenly going in a spirit quest to Wutai and conveniently ending up in the Northern Crater just as General Sephiroth arrived to examine a serious leak had made him suspicious. For one, Harry had no trace of a Kalm accent. His voice was Wutain and something else, something Angeal had never heard before. And that was what made him most suspicious.

As a SOLDIER First Class, Angeal had been all over the world. He had been to jungles, deserts, cities, tiny towns, and the wildest wilderness you can imagine. And nowhere had he heard anyone with the sort of soft-harsh accent Harry had.

He wanted to ask Harry to trust him, and to be honest with him. Angeal didn't think that he was a spy; he had met his fair share of spies and could always tell. Harry was something different. He was clearly strong, but had no touch of the unnatural about him that he would have had if he was exposed to Mako. In fact, his utter lack of Mako was another thing that made Angeal suspicious. In a world where the entire world depended on ShinRa for their power, there were very few people that had never accidentally touched it or chosen to be mildly enhanced.

No, Harry was all-natural and completely wholesome. And Angeal was attracted to that.

"Where are you from again?"

"Kalm."

"Which part?"

"The wharf."

Angeal raised his eyebrows, "The wharf? Can you be vaguer, please?"

Harry laughed a little, but Angeal could tell that he was nervous. Sure enough, the next thing he said was definitely a lie. "My aunt moved all up and down it, so I can't really say that I'm from a specific port. She, uh, wasn't too keen on paying the rent."

Angeal nodded and pretended to dismiss the subject. But his mind whirled into gear, trying to fit together a logical explanation. Was he embarrassed by his background? He was a non-combatant, but he lied about his past for no reason. He had asked a lot of questions about Mako last night, so maybe he was affiliated with a competitor? But ShinRa didn't have competitors. No one had the funds or man power to mine Mako, and ShinRa already had a reactor on every spring, so it was a moot point to begin with. Everything he told him about the injections was available in books on the history of SOLDIER. What could Harry be?

He was plotting a way to weasel the truth out of him when Harry touched his knee.

"When do you need to set out to see the Reactor?"

Angeal was promptly distracted and set about plotting something completely different. He covered Harry's hand with his and began to stroke his wrist through the sleeve of his jumper, "Not until nine, when the light is bright enough and the night monsters are roosting. Why? Did you need me for something?"

Harry sniggered and broke the serious tone the conversation was taking. He apologized, still amused, and said, "Yes, sir, I do think that I might need you for something. I was wondering if you were interested in pursuing what we started last night. I'm not needed until after you've gone and I have nothing…_constructive_ to do with myself until then."

"We can't have that. Idle hands are the devil's workshop."

Angeal leaned over and pulled off the thick socks he'd worn to bed. SOLDIERS had increased body temperatures, but the Northern Crater was really, really cold. Harry bent down and did the same, kicking off the house slippers he was wearing. They removed their sleep shirt and jumper without seeming to pay much attention to the other, and then Harry stood to slip out of his pyjama trousers. Angeal paused in the process of untying the front of his own and reached for him. Harry obliged and came to stand between his spread knees, smiling down at him.

"What are we doing?"

Harry shrugged, "Whatever we want to do. Is that okay? I thought you wanted to, you know, get off with me…"

"Oh, yes, definitely. I was just wondering why now, like this." The way Harry arranged his words was puzzling even then. Angeal had never heard someone speak Common like that. He found himself mimicking him unconsciously.

Harry pushed his hand into Angeal's hair and began rubbing it between his fingers and rolling the strands into cords. He kept his eyes on Angeal's hair instead of meeting his eyes. He had begun to turn faintly pink, so Angeal knew that he was embarrassed. He couldn't resist questioning him in spite of Harry's discomfort.

"I don't know. I haven't been with anyone for a few months now, and I like you, and I thought that you liked me, so this seemed like a good idea. If you don't want to, I can go. I didn't mean to push myself on you."

Angeal put his hands on Harry's hips and gave them a squeeze, "You're not pushing yourself onto me. I like a little aggression. It's sexy. I was just curious. I don't normally get approached by attractive men in the middle of nowhere. It's a nice surprise."

Harry laughed and then finally looked away from his hair and into his eyes. Angeal looked at his green, green eyes, untainted by Mako, and felt himself pulled in as though to a black hole. He couldn't explain what it was he saw there. All he knew was that he didn't want to resist anymore.

He slid his hands up Harry's sides and then levered Harry down onto his knee. He held the back of his head for leverage and kissed him. Harry responded slowly at first, almost shyly, but soon got over his nerves and gripped Angeal around the neck so tightly that Angeal rolled back onto the bed to loosen his hold. They ended up facing one another while lying on their sides.

Angeal decided to copy Harry and be bold, so he grabbed his arse and pulled him closer, moving from Harry's mouth to his neck and then back again. Harry laughed breathlessly and playfully scratched at his shoulders.

"Come on, we only have an hour or so. I want to make it count."

Harry flicked his tongue against Angeal's nose, "I know. Here, take your trousers off. Have you any oil and things?"

Angeal paused in pushing down his trousers and thought. "Yes, in my bag. I'll get them."

"You do that," Harry teased pushing his trousers down and off. He dropped them off the side of the bed, pulled down the covers, and got underneath, "Hurry up; I'm getting cold."

"Don't rush me," Angeal retorted, returning with a condom and a small bottle of lubricant. He handed them to Harry and then removed his trousers without making any attempts at a show. Harry didn't seem the type to require theater in any serious sense of the word. That was Genesis' forte.

Harry propped himself up on the pillows, giving him an appreciative once-over. Angeal crawled closer and got under the covers, lying on his side. He gave Harry a big smile to break the seriousness. Harry put his arms around him tentatively. After a while he whispered wonderingly, "You _are _big!"

"Is that going to be a problem?"

"No!" Harry choked out, taking a moment to grasp Angeal's admittedly large biceps, "My god. I've just never been with someone so impressive. Have you always been like this or is this all Mako?"

"I was a big lad, but I couldn't tell you how much is Mako and how much is me spending too much time in the gym."

Harry murmured something, gave his forearm a final squeeze, and then shuffled closer.

"Do you intend to properly have sex with me or not?"

"That depends," he teased, "on what you mean by proper sex."

Harry gave him an annoyed look, "Are you going to do something with that large body part between your legs or do I have to go down the hall and find someone else who will do me the pleasure of getting me off?"

"You like having your way, don't you?" Angeal pretended to grumble, holding out his hand for the oil. Harry handed it over and he set to work coating his fingers. He dropped a kiss on Harry's lips and then began to kiss him wherever his fancy took him, even arching over to reach the back of Harry's neck. There was a scar on the back of his neck that looked like it had been made with some kind of blade. He filed that away for later consideration.

He hiked Harry's leg over his hip and took advantage of the new angle to begin stretching Harry out. Harry grunted but changed his breathing pattern to ease the process. Angeal could feel from the sheer tightness of him that he hadn't been joking about it being a while. Harry hadn't been lying about doing this before, though. From the way he angled his hips until Angeal's fingers touched his prostate, he knew exactly what he wanted and how to get it.

Harry flexed the leg draped over Angeal's hip every time his fingers bumped his prostate. After several minutes of near-silent kissing and thrusting fingers, Harry reached between them and began to rub Angeal off. Angeal groaned in a mixture of surprise and pleasure and increased the tempo of his stretching. He was beginning to lose patience.

Angeal deemed him ready. He jerked Harry's leg higher, removed his fingers and guided himself inside. Harry was still very tight, but he was very slick and hot. Harry took hold of his shoulders and held on as though for dear life, biting his lip. Angeal knew he wasn't a small man, so he did his best to be considerate of his partner as he breached him. It was difficult. Harry felt divine.

He set a rhythm, and Harry shifted around until he had both arms around Angeal's shoulders before he began to move with him. His breath came out in short huffs, and Angeal made sure that he had a good grip on Harry's hip before he took away one hand and used it to stroke Harry. Harry moaned a little in the back of his throat and bit Angeal's lower lip.

The speed of their lovemaking remained stable until Angeal began to flush. It spread down his chest like a wave. Sweat had begun to gather at Harry's temples. He kissed some of it away and then rolled Harry onto his back. He rearranged Harry's legs so that they were hooked over his shoulders, planted his knees, and began to drive into him. Harry gasped and grunted, and Angeal could feel his legs tensing and relaxing over his shoulders.

He dropped his head and kissed Harry's breastbone, tasting salty sweat.

Harry's was looser now, and as Angeal increased the speed and intensity of his thrusts he became increasingly in danger of slipping out. He jerked Harry's hips tighter against his with every thrust, feeling himself begin to loosen and come undone inside. Harry touched himself to match the thrusts, and Angeal couldn't a spare a hand to assist him, so he contented himself with open-mouthed kisses whenever he could reach Harry's lips.

Harry's orgasm came without warning. One minute he was groaning quietly and twisting beneath him like something in heat, and the next there was a pool of semen coating his chest. He seemed to go limp, eyes half-lidded and lips parted. His face was pink and his eyes were bright beneath their shaded lids.

Angeal felt the cord inside of him snap and pushed forward into Harry powerfully for a minute longer before his orgasm washed over him. It was glorious, and he couldn't even find the brain cells to rub together to worry about crushing Harry as he collapsed on top of him between Harry's now-splayed legs. He was dimly aware of a pair of long arms wrapping around his shoulders and embracing him.

His breath evened out and he felt himself drop off into sleep.

He awoke to the sound of someone knocking on his door. Harry was still asleep beneath him, a mess of naked limbs and twisted sheets. He was a very attractive mess, and Angeal was loath to leave him.

He used some water from the jug on the washstand to wet a corner of the sheet. He wiped himself off and then slipped on his sleep trousers.

Sephiroth was standing in the hall with the itinerary in his hands and a pen poised over it. Angeal groaned.

"For fuck's sakes, what's wrong with it?"

Sephiroth frowned, "Nothing is wrong with the itinerary. I just came to wake you. We leave in 20 minutes, and we won't be stopping for lunch until 1400 hours, so I suggest you eat something for breakfast that won't digest quickly. I recommend the porridge."

Angeal nodded, "Okay, thank you."

Sephiroth looked him over with a critical eye and then raised his eyebrows in understanding, "Who do you have in there?"

"No one!"

Sephiroth gave him one of his rare smirks, "Fine, don't tell me. Don't worry; I won't tell Genesis."

With that, he left in a swirl of long silver hair and descended the stairs. Angeal sighed. Sephiroth was always so graceful.

In his room he began to get dressed in his uniform, making sure to apply an extra thermal shirt beneath his uniform just in case his jacket was damaged. As he dressed he heard Harry stir. He shot him a glance and saw that he was now sitting up against the headboard, his hair standing almost straight up but somehow managing to be in his eyes at the same time. He smiled at Angeal.

"You missed a belt loop by the way."

Angeal looked down, saw that he was right, and corrected it, "Thanks."

.

"Stay warm out there."

"I will," he approached the bed and kissed him. Harry smiled against his lips and touched his face when they broke apart.

"I might not be coming back here," Angeal said suddenly, and realized it was true.

Harry looked down, "I know."

Angeal but his lip and then squatted to take his clipboard out of his bag. He tore off a sheet at the back and scribbled down his PHS number. He handed it to Harry. "If you're ever in Midgar, give me a call. We'll have a non-alcoholic drink."

Harry took the number, "I'd like that."

Angeal kissed him one last time and then slung his bag over his shoulder, "Bye."

When the door closed Harry mouthed 'goodbye'.

He didn't have a PHS.

~000~

The leak was worse than the workers reported. They claimed that it was just one of the tubes that had burst and diverted, but Sephiroth spotted abnormalities in the flow that the technicians missed that led them to three more similar leaks. One of them had infected the ground water that the locals drank.

Sephiroth had the shorter of the technicians Maurice, a family man with an extremely non-threatening face, ask around for local news. At 1400 he returned and reported that a pair of local women had miscarried, a man in his 50s with a chest cough had died unexpectedly early, and the few adolescents that hadn't transferred out for work yet had been unusually restless.

Sephiroth considered having the town quarantined, but decided that it wouldn't be necessary. There was nothing that they could do that could possibly make it more isolated. The Mako that spilled into the water would disperse in two months at the longest, and they only used the ground water to run their plumbing. The locals just melted snow for consumption. It was so clean up here on the Crater that it made no difference, as long as no one had stepped in it.

He made a note of the leak into the ground water, but he knew that it would be rejected by the official report team.

There were many things that upset him about ShinRa, but one of the most fundamental was their refusal to acknowledge their mistakes. To make matters worse, they rarely repaired civilian damages unless it leaked into the news. It made him sick, and as he grew older his tolerance for ShinRa's corruption only shrank.

He was happy that Angeal was with him on this mission; if Angeal hadn't been between protégés he would have had no one to share his outrage with. Genesis didn't seem to care about the injustices of ShinRa anymore. Sephiroth supposed that, in Genesis' eyes, he had larger concerns.

As they sat in the lobby of the reactor eating their lunch, Sephiroth shared what he'd found with Angeal. Angeal looked disgusted and shook his head.

"Pigs; why do they let people live so close to reactors? They really need to adjust that."

Sephiroth was about to commiserate but his PHS vibrated in his breast pocket. Expecting orders, he pulled it out and scanned the text.

_You successfully impregnated Arsinoe Vicissitude._

_Report to Lab.7B immediately upon return. _

_Signed Dr. Hojo._

Sephiroth put away his PHS. His hand did not tremble, but it seemed to have lost all feeling, as if he were wearing thick gloves. He had a bitter taste in his mouth now. He tried to wash it away by drinking some water, but that did it no good. He could tell that Angeal was becoming concerned, but he couldn't bring himself to care. Angeal knew better than to question him when he grew quiet like this.

He tracked and killed the infected monsters without needing to stop and strategize once. That was what most missions like this had become for him: something he did on auto-pilot. He supervised the repairs to ensure the safety of the technicians (Mako didn't become acidic when in contact with his skin), made sure that no one had left anything important at the Inn, and then gave the go-ahead for departure.

Their business in the Northern Crater was complete, and he was going to be a father.

~000~

He had had a second meeting with Arsinoe before his departure, and she'd seemed bemused. He wondered if she'd begun to reconsider what she signed up for. He wouldn't blame her if she did. He was a medical anomaly, and that had to sink in after a while.

During the long and hateful helicopter ride back to ShinRa, he craved mushroom stew. It was little known, but Midgar wasn't known for its variety of produce. Mushrooms had been Sephiroth's favorite food since childhood when a new assistant served him a bowl of tinned mushroom soup. Since then eating a mushroom gave him a sort of guilty pleasure.

The stew they'd been served at Icicle Inn was the best he'd ever tasted. He couldn't put his finger on what made it so good, which fascinated him. He could usually pinpoint exactly what ingredients were in a dish down to what number of syrup and the chemical additives.

To distract himself from the prospect of a new and horrifying round of tests in the labs involving his reproductive equipment, he thought about the young man that served them the stew. Angeal mentioned in passing that he was named Harry and that he was the one to cook the stew. Sephiroth found that unlikely. He had been to the Northern Crater a number of times, and he clearly recalled their cooks being a pair of women named Tabitha and Mary.

Harry was memorable. There was something about his voice and the way he carried himself that put him aside. He liked the soft way he pronounced his vowels and the vulnerable he had of casting down his eyes when he was nervous.

Sephiroth wondered what he was like. He was never very good at talking to people he didn't know in a professional capacity, or since childhood like Angeal and Genesis. As it was, he frequently wanted to talk to people he thought looked interesting but rarely indulged himself. He would have asked him what he liked to do and how long he had been living in the North, and whether or not he liked it. So much of his time was spent like this. Dreaming up things to say and not saying them.

He wondered which of the cooks Angeal was seduced by. They were the only single women under the roof, and though Angeal had experimented, he was generally considered straight.

Sephiroth frowned. He had never experimented with anyone for any reason. He had been used _as _an experiment, but that was different. Come to think of it, he wasn't sure what kind of people he wanted to have sex with. If Hojo had his way he would never find out, only be used as a living sperm bank until he dried up, if he dried up.

Something would have to be done, because that simply would not do.

~000~

Harry traveled to the Nibel Mountains at the end of his contract with Hans at the Northern Crater. It was much closer than Wutai, and Hans didn't mind where he left Harry as long as he was stopping for provisions anyway.

They parted friends, and Harry made his way to the nearest wilderness outfitters to buy the finest they had in insulating clothing. It was technically summer, but the region was chilly at noon and cold at all other times of day and night.

He was looking forward to facing his old nemesis of the Nibel Wolves, but he had also heard that they had dragons even more horrible than the sea monsters he had fought in Wutai. Harry doubted that he would strike quite so lucky twice. His fight with the sea monsters had only gone so well because if it hadn't he would've died. The universe had a funny way of ensuring that his maiden voyages, no matter what sort, went just well enough to catapult him into a near-death experience.

He moved from town to town by word of mouth. He had plenty of funds, but he still tried to find people that were willing to pay for monster killing. It made him feel less like he was wandering aimlessly with no real goal throughout this world.

When he wasn't monster killing, he used magic to repair or dig new wells in the towns he visited, and healed the sick. He learned that the Materia he was using was technically for healing, so it provided a handy cover for his real power. Developing a dual reputation as a Healer and a Warrior made him very welcome in the region, and he found that he was making a name for himself. Once again, he had had the foresight to use the moniker of Desmond.

He didn't want his name in the papers of a dictatorship. Proverbs about nails sticking out getting hammered exist for a reason, and there is nothing a dictatorship hates more than nonconformity.

Summer turned to autumn, and the weather got colder still.

Contrary to all common sense, he moved further north with the weather, catching many normally-dreadful monsters in their weaker moments. When the purse he carried shrunken skins became too full, he traded them for consumables he required.

He was pleased that his sword was still holding up. He was frequently asked what he called it, and was always somewhat embarrassed to admit that he hadn't named the thing. He didn't understand why the warriors of this world named their weapons. It wasn't a pet, or even a plant. It was a tool, and extension of his arm that happened to be sharp and pointy and good at stabbing. He never named his wand; why should he name his sword?

~000~

After much wandering and slaying of monsters of all shapes and sizes, he decided to winter at the nearest town.

This proved easier said than done, as it took him half a month to find another town. There were no accurate maps of this region. He'd checked. Most of them either exaggerated or minimized the scale of the mountains, and other than a few lines to indicate major roads and black dots representing understaffed Mako reactors, there was no direction as to the location of towns and villages.

He was beginning to consider settling into a cave for the long snowy months ahead when he stumbled upon a little jewel box of a town very high up in the mountains. It was so high that he had trouble breathing if he climbed a mere hundred feet higher up the side of the mountain. A glance at his useless map revealed its proximity to a reactor. It must be where the workers lived.

All of the buildings were rustic, and from his gauging its population was a thousand at most.

He strode into the town pub (every village or town, no matter how small, had a pub) and ordered a beer. The barman, a tall bearded man with an impressive gut, frowned at him but took his money. For a moment Harry thought that he was going to be turned out.

He should have been expecting this. This town, whatever it was called, was very remote indeed. He'd discovered that the more remote a town was, the un-friendlier its inhabitants. He chalked it up to the inbreeding and tried not to take it too personally when grannies spit on him for being foreign.

The beer was quite good, with a strong smack of apples to it.

Harry didn't even try to make conversation with anyone; he knew it wouldn't be welcome. Besides, there was an inn, so he didn't need to convince anyone to let him sleep under their roof. He had a trio of beers, the magic number, and watched the other patrons watch him.

He was the shortest man there under 70; it was intimidating to look around and see a crowd of men drinking together, all of which looked like they would rather have a stray dog in their tavern than a lonely traveler. Most of the men were overweight, like most of the northerners he'd seen. They didn't have much of a choice. Quality outdoor wear was expensive, and human fat was a cheaper layer of warmth. In the same line of thinking, all of them were bearded. Most wore flannel shirts and thick woolen jumpers over them knit with stylized nature motifs or local monsters. Their trousers were wool or corduroy, and they all wore thick-soled rubber boots.

Harry, dressed in his expensive camouflage costume, felt overdressed.

When he was finished with his third beer, he nodded to the bar man to show that he was leaving, and left. He trudged through the muddy lanes that served for streets towards the Inn, hands stuffed into his pockets in spite of his gloves. It was maybe ten at night. He tried not to stay up too late unless he was hunting. It was a bad sleep schedule for his needs.

He was minding his own business, humming a little under his breath, when he heard a muffled cry and a series of thumps. He frowned. The sounds came from the darkened alley between two shops. He almost dismissed the incidence as none of his business, but a gust of wind blew toward him carrying the scent of blood.

Now he couldn't have ignored it if he wanted to. His Saving People thing was fully operational despite the beer buzzing in his ears. He stalked into the alley and coughed loudly.

Closer now, he could see in the dim light of the stars a group of adolescent boys standing guiltily in a semi-circle around a crumpled figure on the ground. Harry folded his arms.

"Now, lads, what have you been doing back here?"

No one answered, so he went on. He hoped that they understood Common, because otherwise he was going to look like a right idiot lecturing young men who couldn't even understand him.

"It looks like you've been taking a few swings at a defenseless peer of yours. That is bad behavior no matter the circumstances, and I'm afraid I'm going to have to inform your parents if you don't say you're sorry and trot along home immediately."

There was a moment of mumbles and shuffling, and then a chorus of gruff cracking voices apologized in Common, all with rough accents. Harry was surprised. Most of the people in this region spoke only a little Common, preferring their ancestral dialects, many of which sounded Germanic.

He waved his hand in dismissal, and they dispersed. He squatted beside the fallen boy and laid a hand on his neck to check his pulse. It was fast, frightened, like a mouse. He sighed and took out his Materia. A quick round of spells geared to hasten his body's natural healing process later, he introduced himself.

"Hello young man; my name is Desmond, and I'm a warrior looking to winter here. Can you direct me to an Inn where I can spend the night?" He knew damn well where the Inn was, but he wanted an excuse to keep the boy with him for as long as possible. If his attackers were watching, they would assume that Harry had taken the boy under his wing and hopefully leave him alone for a while.

The boy sat up slowly and cautiously. In the starlight a small white hand came up to gently feel his bloody nose. He winced, and a stab of pity shot through Harry's heart. He was reminded of Dudley's game of Harry Hunting when they were both so young.

"Are you alright?"

The boy nodded.

"What's your name?"

There was a long silence. Harry could feel the boy scrutinizing him, trying to decide if he should trust a stranger, even if the stranger had saved him from getting some broken bones. Finally he whispered, "I'm Cloud. And my mother has a room for let. It will be cheaper than the Inn if you intend to winter here. The innkeeper cheats."

Harry stood and held out his hand to Cloud. Cloud took it, and Harry could feel warm sticky blood on his hand. He frowned in the dark and wondered what a boy Cloud's age was doing out alone in the night. He assumed that he was young because of his small size and high voice.

Cloud didn't speak on the way to his house, and Harry didn't blame him.

They passed out of the town proper and into the scattered residential area that he had seen from the cliffs on his way earlier. They passed by a thick set of evergreens that looked like an overgrown deliberately-planted hedge. Harry felt a very strong creeping sensation along his spine as they passed, and took note of its location for investigation the next day. What could have made him feel so uncomfortable?

Cloud's house was smaller than the others they'd passed, and set slightly apart. There was light in the window, so Harry assumed that the boy's parents were awake and waiting for their son to arrive. Outside the door, Cloud paused and tried unsuccessfully to clean the worst of the blood off. Harry took pity on him and fished out some wipes that he carried with him just in case. Cloud accepted them and allowed Harry to delicately clean his face. Many small cuts and scrapes were revealed during this, and Harry felt something constrict in his throat. Cloud kept his eyes downcast. Harry did his best to be gentle.

When they'd done their best, Harry wadded the wipes and pocketed them, never mind the germs. He would clean the costume with magic later.

"Are you better now?"

Cloud nodded, glancing up for a moment. In the starlight his eyes looked clear and bright. He was an attractive boy, if a bit on the effeminate side. Harry wondered if he was beaten by the other boys because of a girl.

Cloud knocked on the door. It swung open a moment later and he was swallowed up in the bosom of a pretty woman young that Harry assumed was his sister or perhaps a cousin. She began to scold him rapidly in the local dialect, and then stopped abruptly when she caught sight of Harry.

Harry waved and smiled, doing his best to appear harmless and daft, or as much as he could wearing an expensive costume and carrying a large sword strapped to his back.

Cloud touched her arm to get her attention and said something quietly, jerking his head at a sign in the window, on which was written in clumsy letters,

_Room to Let_

She straightened and seemed to relax a little. She shooed Cloud inside and then stood aside so that Harry could pass. She smelled like fresh bread and radishes, a pleasant but unusual combination. He had stepped into an open room with a stove in the center, a fireplace against one wall, and a set of armchairs. The floor was covered with rugs made from braided rags, and the walls were hung with what looked like hand-hooked woolen hangings depicting local flora and fauna (he assumed).

He smiled and accepted the mug of hot tea she brought to him, and dutifully sat when she gestured at the armchairs. Cloud had disappeared into one of the two doors on the far side of the room. It was not a large space, but it was cozy and warm.

The tea was delicious, and he was just starting to relax when the woman asked in rough Common,

"How long you want to stay?"

He chewed his lip, "How long are the snows heavy here?"

"Five months, sometimes six."

His eyes went wide. Perhaps he should have selected a town less high in the mountains to winter, but with the way the winds had been, this town was his only option for at least another week's walking.

"How much per day?"

She shrugged and the named a ridiculously low price. Nonplussed, he asked to see the room. She nodded and stood. She opened the door Cloud hadn't entered. It was a very small room containing a narrow bed, made long to accommodate the northern men, a rug, a table with a basin, and a chamber pot. There was also a large chest against the far wall. There was only one window, and it was the size of a frying pan and set with such a thick pane of glass that seeing out of it would require the eyes of a Seer.

It was perfect.

He turned to her, held out his hand, and said, "I will take it, but I am paying you three times what you ask for. I can eat a lot, and I don't want to watch anyone go hungry."

Her eyes turned to saucers. They were very pretty eyes, much like her sons, and a lovely shade of blue.

"No, no, that is too much to pay!"

He was firm. She continued to protest until he held up his hand and said that he was tired and would like to sleep. She settled and gave him a shy smile. He smiled back, held out his hand, and introduced himself as Desmond.

She hesitated and then shook it. Her hands were strong but she didn't grip his hand for more than a millisecond before she pulled it away.

"I am Constance Strife. My son is called Cloud. You eat with us in main room tomorrow at first light, yes."

He nodded, "I will be there. Will your father, Mr. Strife, or anyone else living here also need to approve me, or can I unpack?"

Her face darkened, the spark of friendliness that he'd coaxed to life disappearing as though it'd never been there. "My parents are dead to me, and Cloud has no father. He is a bastard."

Harry was surprised. Constance was Cloud's mother? She didn't look older than 25. Perhaps Cloud was tall for his age. He concealed his confusion, smiled again, and said goodnight. She just nodded and swept back to the fire. Just before he could close his door, she coolly called,

"I sleep with axe. Do not steal from me. I know your face."

He closed his door. There was a lamp on the chest, which he lit. He undressed until he wore only his thick woolen underwear, and got into bed.

Lying in bed, he found himself once again thinking about Angeal. It was months ago already, but it didn't feel like that long. Angeal was so different from Ayu, but he was even more attracted to him. He still didn't know what possessed him to make such a brave move of seduction. Never in a million years did he think that he would be the kind of person that just showed up in people's bedrooms and asked for sex, but he wasn't sorry he'd done it.

He still felt a persistent nagging of guilt about the few seconds when he was with Angeal that he wished it was Sephiroth instead. He consoled himself that it was only natural. Angeal was very handsome and he loved the heavy sense of masculinity that hung around him, but Sephiroth's presence was distracting. Did that make Harry two-faced? He hoped not.

It hardly mattered now, he supposed. If he ever did make his way to Midgar and join ShinRa in some way like he was planning, it would be long after Angeal had forgotten him. Angeal probably slept with hundreds of willing men and women like he'd slept with Harry.

Irritated with himself for being sentimental, he rolled onto his side and watched the faint light coming through his window until he fell asleep.

~000~

End Chapter Four

Dang it. I think this might turn out to be longer than a dozen chapters after all. Oh, and hey, look, Cloud!


	5. Chapter 5

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter Five

~000~

Gooseflesh remained with him even in the elevator.

The laboratories were always cold. The heating and cooling systems of the ShinRa tower were as convoluted and corrupt as its government. This meant that some floors were hotter than a jungle all year round, whereas others were like the frozen tundra, untouched even by the hottest of summers.

Sephiroth didn't notice the cold, though. Riding the elevator back to his office, all he could think about was what he had heard Hojo muttering to himself while he took notes on Sephiroth's latest sperm count and blood work. At first he couldn't believe what he was hearing, but when Hojo began to expand on his subject, he had no choice but to accept it as fact.

Hojo planned to have him impregnate a new woman every month, then every week, and then every day even if it required artificial insemination.

But why? Hojo had mentioned nothing of his motives for this latest ghastly experiment. Sephiroth couldn't think of a logical reason. If he was trying to breed super soldiers, Hojo would die of old age before they reached maturity. No one talked about it openly, but Hojo's increasingly frailty was becoming a concern. He would be seventy in a few years, and though his lank hair was still as black as pitch, Sephiroth could see the tiny quivering in his hands as he handled his tools and knew that Hojo had begun assigning away more and more of his work.

So why now? Unless he had found some new way to artificially age someone, this experiment was useless. Could he be selling the children to wealthy families to increase revenue for his department? He knew that funding was always hotly fought over and that Hojo didn't always get enough to support his plans. He wouldn't put it past Hojo to sell Sephiroth's children.

He nodded to his secretary, Ginger, and asked for a cup of tea. She grunted and stood to fetch it.

Inside his office, he logged into his computer on a whim and hacked into the digital health records of the ShinRa employees. He had done so before during a fiasco when the protein drink made for SOLDIER became infected in the labs and ShinRa refused to acknowledge the mistake. The health records had been powerful evidence, and eventually the President had no choice but to recall the drink and replace it.

He typed in his name and waited for the page to load.

When it did, it was so obviously faked that he felt insulted. His blood type was wrong, and someone had said that his eyes were brown pre-Mako. Sephiroth clearly remembered his eyes being gray before the Mako turned them their current color at age seven. Even his height and weight were false! There was no record of his injuries in Wutai (a well-kept secret, so he supposed that he shouldn't be too surprised), and certainly no record of his many injections. According to this record, he was injected once a month with the SOLDIER Firsts. And there was absolutely no mention of any sexual history.

Why did he have a fake profile?

If this was a fake, then his real records had to be somewhere. He looked at the reports he was supposed to be reviewing and decided that they could wait.

Ginger entered with a steaming mug of tea and left it on his desk. They had a relationship based on mutual respect and sharing of responsibilities. Unlike the other officials in his department, Sephiroth did not believe in drinking all day and leaving his under-qualified secretary to wade through reports far above her clearance level. It was no wonder that the company made so many stupid mistakes.

He spent the next three hours scouring the entire database. He looked everywhere. He opened every file and checked for code in each one. There was nothing. There was only a collection of articles that mentioned him (sizable), his false health record (negligible), and his collected reports from across his entire career (upsettingly massive).

This could only mean that a physical copy of his health records existed somewhere, and probably somewhere secret.

~000~

Scarlet was nervous. She was not a woman that usually allowed herself to feel nervous. She had conquered the glass ceiling, bullied the President of the entire Planet into giving her the lion's share of funding three years running, and was in a very fulfilling relationship with a man ten years her junior.

But she couldn't help it. Sephiroth made her nervous. Everything about him made her nervous, too. His indefinite age, his determined manner of unflinching purpose, and his unspeakable beauty all unnerved her.

Finally she worked up the nerve to knock on his door. A moment later he called,

"Come in!"

She came into his office as silently as a ghost. Sephiroth gave her his strange, blank, sphinx-look. When she made no move to speak, he asked,

"Can I help you?"

"Yes!" she told herself to stop sounding like a little girl and pull herself together. She took a breath and seated herself, "Yes, I need your help."

She knew she'd surprised him even though he displayed no outward sign of it. She opened her briefcase and removed the copy of her project she'd made for him. She passed it to him to look over. He accepted it and opened the file, bright eyes flicking back and forth as he speed-read its contents. His eyebrows went down and his eyes went up, pinning her to the visitor's seat like a butterfly under a spike.

"Why did you come to me with this?"

"I would like to collaborate with you," she swallowed and went on, "You are aware that Mako has become increasingly difficult to mine, and consequently more expensive. This has caused some unrest and the company's unwillingness to replace faulty reactors has resulted in a much higher monster population, and they are breeding quickly. I believe that moving the military's focus from Mako-based firearms to those that utilize electricity would help the company conserve funds and prevent a shortage of weapons before it can occur. I heard that your department has been having problems keeping everyone supplied as it is."

He was quiet for a minute and then said, "That is correct. I agree to assist you. I assume that you wish me to accompany you to the President's office and help you present the project?"

"I would be very grateful. I was wondering, do you think that we should approach Lazard? He _is _the head of the program."

"That would be helpful," Sephiroth agreed, nodding. "The President respects Lazard's judgment, which can only help. Inform me when we due to make our presentation."

That was a clear dismissal if she ever heard one. She stood and then, on impulse, bowed her head, and departed. Outside she visibly relaxed. Ginger glanced up from her desk and raised her eyebrows at Scarlet's sagged shoulders but said nothing. Scarlet liked Ginger. Ginger kept to herself and didn't gossip.

When she was ready, she strode off in the direction of Lazard's office, this time with far more confidence. If Lazard heard that Sephiroth was on her side, he would agree to whatever she showed him.

~000~

The next morning Harry woke feeling warm and snug. He was so used to sleeping on the ground outside or on cheap pallets at inns that the very thought of leaving his new bed to eat breakfast was repugnant.

A sharp knock on his door with the accompaniment of Constance's command, "Up!" broke through his dozy fog. Grumbling a little, he got out of bed and began his morning stretching routine. It was quite advanced now, and took fifteen long minutes to perform. It was the only thing that kept him from turning into an old man filled with aches and pains before his time. Never on Earth had he done anything half as hard as living off the land.

He pulled on thick trousers and a jumper. After a moment's thought he added thick socks he'd purchased from a widow at the last town he visited. They were bright blue with white snowflakes, and he rather liked them.

"Sorry that took so long," he apologized, exiting his room and meeting Constance's eyes. She was by the stove stirring something in a pan. She shrugged.

"If you want hunger, sleep long."

He grinned and she softened a little. He was handed a wooden plate and an apple.

"Breakfast done soon. Cloud outside with firewood. You help."

He wasn't expecting to be put to work so soon, but he nodded and returned to his room for his coat and boots. He pulled on his gloves and then went outside to find Cloud. He was behind the house wielding an axe much too big for him, grunting with effort. Harry waited until he had set the axe down before he cleared his throat. He didn't want to startle the boy into cutting off his foot.

Cloud jumped and stared at him. Harry tried to look friendly, but that had become harder since he spent most of his time alone outdoors. He saw no reason to smile if no one could see him do so.

"Hello."

"Hello," Cloud replied, looking at the ground. He was shy, Harry surmised. He looked very young.

"How old are you, Cloud?"

"Thirteen."

Never mind. He was simply small for his age. Harry supposed that he shouldn't be so surprised. The boy's mother was quite petite. He stepped closer and held out his hand for the axe. Cloud hesitated and then passed it to him.

Harry asked to be shown where the wood was that required chopping. Cloud led him a little further into the woods and then indicated a fallen tree that had been clumsily hacked at in various places, presumably by Cloud. He set Cloud to work gathering brush.

Left mostly alone, he analyzed the tree and then set about chopping off one of the larger branches. The axe was easy to wield, and he soon came to enjoy the satisfying swing of it and the loud cracks that followed every splitting of the wood. In no time he was covered in sweat and had managed to make a sizable stack of firewood.

Cloud returned and gazed at the neatly-chopped firewood with wide-eyed admiration. He looked from it to Harry and back again, and then smiled. It was the first smile Harry had seen from him, and it was very nice. He smiled back.

"How would you like to help me stack this against your house?"

"Okay."

They were half-done when they heard Constance calling for them. Harry led the way inside, Cloud following him like a gosling. Harry deposited his armful of firewood into the basket by the fire and put another log on. Constance sat in one armchair, her plate on her lap, and told them to divide what was left between them as they saw fit.

Harry served Cloud first and then took the last three eggs and what remained of the friend tubers. He wondered if tubers were native to this region or if they had been brought over by an explorer years before. Whatever their origin, they were very good. Constance had added some onion and dried parsley that really complimented the tubers. The eggs weren't bad either. It was a nice reprieve from his meat-heavy diet. There were many varieties of monster, but after a while it all started to taste the same.

They ate in silence. Harry thought about the creeping sensation he had the night before and decided to investigate it that afternoon. He would spend the morning making himself useful if he was wanted and, if not, hunting.

Constance finally asked, "What do you do with your day?"

Harry held out his hands, "Whatever you would like me to do. I would like to do some exploring this afternoon, but my morning is available."

She thought and said, "You did well on firewood. Go and chop until noon. We need to begin storing up for winter. Snow is too strong to see to chop."

Harry nodded to show that he'd understood, "And what will you and Cloud do today?"

"Cloud go to school," she gave him a very stern look and Cloud scowled, "And I go to town to work. I weave," she pointed at the wall hangings. Harry nodded again.

"Okay, alright. And what time will you want me back tonight when I've finished exploring?"

"Be here at 10 or earlier. I lock the door when I sleep, and if you miss me you sleep outside. Dinner is at five. I no save you food."

"That's fair. I'll just go outside and set to chopping, shall I?"

She gave him a stoic look. He felt silly for no reason, and quickly reapplied his outerwear and went outside.

It was marginally warmer now that the sun had begun to rise. He set about chopping. He took a break every half an hour to stretch his shoulders and relax his hand. He worried that if he didn't his hand would get frozen into a fist and never recover even though he knew it was irrational.

He made very good progress, and the burn of the heavy physical labor felt good on the cold morning. He rarely used lightening charms these days; he didn't need them anymore. He was by no means vain, and had never worried much over his appearance, but he knew that he cut a fine figure of a man now. Much finer than he'd been when he was an Auror and all he had to do was some light jogging and wave his wand around. It was no wonder that so many wizards were fat and weak by the time they reached thirty.

Constance returned an hour before noon and heated a jar of soup she took out of their tiny pantry. It was only enough for them to have a cup each, but Harry didn't complain. He knew that she hadn't replenished their stores yet with the first half of his rent he'd paid her. He didn't blame her for waiting to spend his money. She was still deciding if he was a psycho or not.

Once again they ate mostly in silence, but this time Constance asked him where he was from as they were finishing.

"Kalm, but I've been traveling from place to place for a year now, so a little of everywhere is probably a better answer."

"Why?" she was blunt.

"Why have I been travelling? Well, lots of reasons. I like new places, new cultures, and having experiences. I make my money monster killing and doing odd jobs. It's not a bad life for a single man."

"You…kill monsters?"

"Yes."

She looked pleased suddenly. "Then you will kill them if they break my pantry this winter?"

"Of course. I will gladly protect your household. It's my house too until the snows melt. I'll kill anything."

"Even if they are _wolves_?" she said 'wolves' softly, as if it were a bad word. He decided not to tell her that he hunted Nibel wolves for fun. It wouldn't do to look like a liar or a braggart, depending on whether or not she believed him.

"Yes, even if they are wolves. I give my word."

She smiled and took his cup. She dropped it into a bucket of soapy water to soak and then began putting on her overcoat. It was heavily patched and made from cheap discolored wool. One of her boots had a wooden sole. No wonder she looked so wan. She was a single mother in a small town, and not financially secure. It was no wonder that Cloud was bullied; he was different from the others.

He hoped that the money he gave her made things easier. Knowing her profession, he'd taken a peek at her hands while they ate and saw that they were bright red and thickly calloused in places. They were small and the fingers neat, so he knew that they were once as pretty as the rest of her, but too much hard work had destroyed them. They looked like the claws of some wild bird.

He armed himself while she waited and made sure that he kept his Materia hidden. Constance didn't come across as a gossip, but he didn't want news spreading that the new stranger in town had Materia. It was very expensive, apparently. Once again he found himself wondering why and how that strange jungle bird had spat it at him. Was it connected to the World Flower, watching over him? Or was it simply another of the inexplicable experiences that filled his life's history?

He would never know.

Constance locked the door when he exited and trudged towards town. The house was in the same direction, so he walked with her. She seemed uncomfortable at first. He supposed that she was worried about him forcing himself on her, or perhaps she was concerned that someone would see them together and draw the wrong conclusions.

She gradually began to relax until she trudged quite easily beside him. He wondered if they were the same age. She looked much younger when she relaxed the frown between her fine eyebrows.

They neared the evergreens, and he slowed. She noticed where his attention had wandered and paled.

"Harry, that place dangerous. It the ShinRa Mansion. It haunted."

Haunted? They had ghosts here? This he had to see.

He gave Constance a reassuring smile, "Don't worry about me. I won't go inside. I just want to see the grounds." That was a lie, but she didn't need to know that.

She was frowning again, "You are foolish kind of man. Why you want to go?"

"I'll be fine!"

Constance huffed and rearranged her scarf, "Fine. Be stupid. I no care. Don't be late at dark!"

And with that she stalked off down the lane towards town. He watched her go, fascinated by the rope-thick braid of blond hair that swung from side to side as long as her hips. She had as much hair as Hermione! It explained Cloud's wild mass of blond hair that seemed to stand straight up.

When she was out of sight he followed the wall of evergreen until he found a gate. It was chest-high and made of planks held together by iron bars. It was locked, but a simple unlocking charm solved that problem. He closed it behind him and strolled down the path. The garden, if that's what it was, was overgrown with nettles. He thought he saw something move and stopped looking where he was walking. As a consequence his foot went right into a small pit, dug by a rodent of some kind no doubt, and fell flat on his face.

Feeling a bit sheepish now and hoping no one was looking, he stood back up and dusted himself off. He paid closer attention to where he was walking from then on, and avoided a number of pitfalls and large cracks in the stones that made up the path.

The house was indeed a mansion, and could easily be haunted by Muggle standards. It was in a profound state of disrepair. The only window still intact was a large circular stained glass one over the entrance. He approached cautiously, considered entering, but decided to check the perimeter of the building first.

As he walked around the property, he peered in the windows at the interior. The house couldn't have been abandoned more than a few decades because the interior was still mostly intact. There was some evidence of small animals having found their way inside, and there was a layer of dust and dead leaves on the floor, but as for serious damage there didn't appear to be any.

Through one window he spotted what looked like a large walk-in safe simply sitting in the middle of an undecorated room. He frowned and mentally made note to investigate that. He was positive that if there was any money in the house it would be long gone, but just in case he was wrong he was going to look into it.

He finished his perimeter with the knowledge that the mansion, although very long and several stories high, was quite narrow. It was much smaller than it appeared. There were only two entrances that he could see: the front door and a small service door on the right side of the house next to a chimney.

The door was locked. He charmed it open and stepped cautiously inside. The house was very dark, so there was a chance that monsters lurked in the shadows. He slotted his Materia into his sword and began casting illumination spells until he located a chandelier above his head. He flicked his fingers and it came to life, the hundreds of tiny candles inside of it lighting. They revealed no monsters, only cobwebs and weather-beaten furniture. He was tempted to banish the mess, but didn't want to leave obvious signs of his presence.

He continued to keep his guard up as he explored the first floor. There wasn't much to see. It reminded him of the ancestral mansions that some Pureblood families possessed. This house was much smaller than, say, Malfoy Manor, but it was larger than the Nott estate.

He encountered what looked like a rabbit in the kitchen, rustling among a basket of small plants that once were tubers. He left it in peace, opened a few cupboards, and walked back to the front of the house. He headed in the direction of the room with the safe.

It was unremarkable as far as safes go. What made it unusual was its size. It was obviously heavy. The floorboards on all sides sloped down to it. How had it been brought here, and for what purpose?

It was locked, too. He touched his Materia and willed it open.

A monster sprang at him. He leapt back and to the side, startled. It was just slightly smaller than the size of the safe, and there was something wrong with it. Its eyes were crazed and shone with malevolent red light. Its maw dripped with something slimy and foul-smelling. The sheer stench that came from the inside of the safe and the monster made Harry's eyes water. He gagged and the monster flew at his throat. He dropped to the floor and rolled away, but it followed.

He slashed at it with his sword. It moved quickly, and all he managed was a shallow cut on its flank. Lumpy fluid that burned a hole through the floor dribbled out of the cut. This appeared to enrage the monster, and it flung its body against the walls, snarling. Its eyes rolled in their sockets.

Harry slashed again, this time catching it on the collar. More acid poured out. A sizable hole began growing in the floor. Harry had to watch where he stepped as the monster came at him. A swipe of its paw sent him flying into the wall. he felt bruises form and lost the wind in his lungs. He gasped for breath as the monster charged. He knew that if he didn't act soon he would die. The monster howled and Harry quickly held up his sword in front of him.

The monster was moving too fast to stop, and impaled itself on his blade. Harry screamed, shocked when acid exploded out of the monster and onto his hands, badly burning them. The monster's weight pinned him against the wall. it took him five minutes of deseperate shimmying to work his way out from under it. Some of the acid blood dripped onto his face, just missing his eyes. He yelled and quickly pressed his burning hands to his face, reaching out with his mind for the Materia.

Green light suffused him, and the pain subsided. He watched in horror and fascination as his hands first became pussy, then swollen, then scarred, and then perfectly healed as though nothing had happened. The ghost pain remained, twinging every once in a while.

He sagged against the safe, exhausted. It was only one o'clock, but he needed to sleep for a week. The sheer stress of his fight had worn him out. He decided to give in to his exhaustion and look for a bed to sleep on. He did not want to look at the monster again, but he had to retrieve his sword. He turned around and stared. The monster was gone. It's blood had melted it, leaving his sword lying in a pool of rapidly-dissolving wood. He picked it up and left quickly, hearing a loud crash behind him. he looked back and saw that the safe had fallen through the floor. There must be a basement.

He decided to worry about the basement later and focus on napping for now.

Upstairs there were a number of bedrooms, many still in reasonably good condition despite being exposed to the elements. He chose a room at random and closed the door. He locked it and repaired the broken windows with a wave of his wand. A cleaning spell later, he lay down on the bed and almost immediately dropped into sleep.

He awoke maybe an hour later groggy but more prepared to explore the house.

There was nothing very interesting on the top floor, just bedrooms and water closets. He did find a small study in one of the corner rooms, but the desk was empty of everything but a paper clip and a broken clock. He even checked for secret compartments and came up empty.

He looked for an entrance to the attic and found the ladder in a closet, but a quick diagnostic revealed that not only was it empty, it was also structurally unstable. There were a lot of leaks that had led to the heavy snows rotting the boards.

The stairs creaked as he descended them, so he decided the hell with it and repaired them. He hoped no one would get suspicious of a detail like that.

In the room where he'd fought the monster, the wind had carried away the worst of the scent. But even more noticible than that was that there was no longer any floor. The acid had completely rotted it away up to the wall seams. There was a deep pit that went straight down into darkness.

He cast an illumination charm and peeked over the edge. The safe had collapsed into what appeared to be a room full of coffins. He frowned. That would explain the rumors of haunting. Perhaps there was an epidemic or something and a large number of the household died. He flicked his wrist and banished the rubbish and the empty safe. It was disrespectful to leave a stack of rubbish in a crypt, even a forgotten one in a basement. He conjured a rope and secured it to a nearby pillar in the entry way. He descended into the crypt.

The coffins were unmarked and appeared to have been stacked willy-nilly. Now that he was closer he could see that some were open. They were empty. Perhaps they were all empty, and he'd banished the rubbish for no reason. But…then why were some of them nailed shut?

He decided to risk it. He took out his knife and pried open the lid to the nearest coffin. It snapped off easily, half-rotted already. It was empty but for a small handful of dust. Harry was puzzled. This coffin wasn't old enough for its contents, whatever they were, to turn to dust.

Something didn't make sense.

He opened three more, getting the same result. He opened all of them for the hell of it, banishing them if they were empty. Two contained stacks of newspaper, apparently for no reason. He skimmed them, and found them thirty years old. What kind of weirdo put newspaper in a coffin? There was nothing noteworthy in the articles either other than a mention of ShinRa's plan to fund experiments for a super soldier.

There was one coffin left. He sighed and almost considered banishing it without opening it. What was the point of wasting his time when it contained newspaper or dust?

But what if it didn't? The possibility that this one would be different was enough motivation for him to crawl over and crouch beside it with his knife. He stuck out his tongue with concentration as he pried at the screws. This one was shut much more securely. Maybe this one really was different.

The lid released with a soft 'pop' sound. Harry pushed it aside and jumped back with a yell when he found a person inside of it. For all of his theorizing, he no longer expected to see a real-live person after opening all of those other coffins. He stood there with his fist in his mouth and the slowly approached. There was no stench of rotting, only a faint mustiness.

He looked closer. The person inside the definitely-old coffin didn't appear to be dead. In fact, he looked like he was merely asleep. He was tall and dressed in a long red cloak. His hands were folded over his chest. On one hand was a sharp-looking gold glove made of metal. Harry wondered what its purpose had been. Long black hair was pulled over one shoulder and swirled over his chest. A red bandage of some kind covered his eyes, and the high collar of his cloak concealed his mouth.

Harry stepped closer and hesitated. He stretched out his hand, hesitated again, and then pushed back the bandage covering the man's eyes. They were closed. He was very pale, but he did not look dead. Harry pushed back the collar and in a fit of boldness pressed his hand to the slim white neck he found there. The man's face was beautiful, and reminded him vaguely of General Sephiroth's. There was the same fine nose and mix of aristocratic and angelic influences in the harmony of the features.

He waited several tense seconds and then jumped when he felt a pulse. He tore his hand away, breathing hard, and then tentatively tried again. Maybe he was mistaken. He could have felt a gust of wind and thought that it was-

_Thump… thump… thump…_

No, he was not mistaken. There was a definite pulse there, though it was so faint and slow that it could only be the pulse of someone very deeply asleep. He slowly took away his hand, breathing through his mouth. He closed his eyes, counted to ten, and opened them again. The man was still there.

And then the man stirred. Harry sprang to his feet and stepped back, sword at the ready. The man raised his ungloved hand and rubbed at his eyes, sighing. He then stopped and seemed to take note of his location and the missing ceiling. Then he turned to Harry and looked him right in the eye.

His eyes were red.

"Who are you?"

A moment passed before Harry realized that the man had made no move to suck his blood or even to do much of anything, and that he had asked him a question.

"I'm, ah, Desmond. And you are?"

"Vincent. Why did you wake me?"

Harry coughed, "I didn't mean to. I thought you were dead."

Vincent didn't say anything to this. His red eyes swept the pit slowly, settling on a door Harry hadn't noticed. It was made of rusting steel and looked industrial. It was sorely out of place.

"Is Hojo dead?"

"Who?"

Vincent looked irritated for the briefest of seconds before his face smoothed back into its previous unreadability. "Professor Hojo, the scientist responsible for these laboratories and their contents."

"What laboratories?" Harry was beginning to feel like a tool, but he really did have no idea what this Vincent was talking about. All he'd found were empty parlors and bedrooms. There weren't even any books on the shelves of what he thought must once have been a library.

Vincent gestured at the door, "Didn't you come through there?"

Harry slowly shook his head. Understanding flashed through Vincent's eyes.

"You are a stranger. You came through the ceiling."

"Yes."

"Ah, now everything is explained," and with that cryptic remark Vincent swung a long leg over the side of the coffin and stood. He stretched his arms high above his head, bent to touch his toes, stretched high again, and dropped his arms to his sides. He looked Harry over with a critical eye and stated, "You are a warrior."

"Yes, after a fashion."

"Good. That means you like justice, or at least death. Come with me. You will help."

Harry almost asked what he would be helping with, but a glance at Vincent's sharp claw silenced him. Vincent slammed his fist against the lock of the industrial door and it went flying. Harry ducked and heard it smash into something behind him. He noted that Vincent was much stronger than his thin build belied.

Vincent jerked the door open and disappeared into the hall beyond it. Harry cast an illumination charm before following, not caring if Vincent realized that his magic was abnormal. Vincent was abnormal himself.

The hall was also made of metal. A layer of slime had grown on it, and he could hear something dripping in the distance. The floor was tiled with large green tiles streaked here and there with black rubber lines, as though from heavy wheeled carts brought up and down its length. They began to pass by doors. Harry wondered what was behind them.

Why was there a mansion in the middle of nowhere with a giant labyrinth of what Vincent called laboratories in its basement? And what did this have to do with the 30-year-old newspapers he'd found in the coffins?

Vincent stopped abruptly in front of a door. Like the others it was made of steel and unlabelled.

He repeated his earlier trick of punching the lock into oblivion. The door opened with a squeak of hinges. Faint green light was the first thing Harry saw. As his eyes accustomed themselves to the gloom, he became aware that the light was emanating from a pair of vertical tubes the height of a human male.

They contained squid-like creatures that writhed slowly in the green liquid surrounding them. They were covered with sensors and wires that trailed down to disappear into the base of the tubes. Something about the way they moved alerted Harry that they were in pain.

Vincent walked to a control panel against the wall, punched a complex series of buttons, and pulled down a lever. There was a beep, and then the creatures jerked before going limp. Vincent pushed another button and the fluid drained away. The creatures collapsed limply to the base of the tubes.

"Are they dead?" Harry asked. Vincent nodded. Harry didn't even need to think about vanishing their remains. The room was dark without the light of the green fluid. Only Harry's spell gave off any light.

Vincent led the way out and left the door open. They repeated this process over and over. All that changed were the types of creatures encased in the tubes. Harry was sick when he realized that all of them had a trace of the humanoid about them. He didn't need to ask Vincent to know that these creatures once were human.

They ran out of rooms eventually. Vincent turned a corner and there was a small wood door, incongruous against the metal wall. Vincent opened it and inside there were shelves upon shelves of folders and messy stacks of notepaper covering everything like dust. Vincent seated himself in the roller chair and began looking over some of the papers.

Harry left him to it and began browsing the shelves. His attention was drawn to a collection of thick folders with Project S, Project A, and Project G typed on their labels. He pulled out Project S and opened it to the middle. There was a sheet of what looked like someone's blood work. He flipped through a few more pages of similar medical tests and was just starting to get bored when he turned one more page and found a picture of what could only be a young Sephiroth.

He started reading the information there, and realized that it was a list of injections of toxic chemicals with notes on Sephiroth's reaction to them. Passages regarding Sephiroth's uncanny ability to overcome illness were underlined with wobbly red lines. Harry felt anger surge through his veins. No one deserved to be injected with mold just to see what would happen!

He gathered up all the Project S folders and conjured a sack to stick them in. he shrunk the sack and pocketed it with a security charm so that he wouldn't lose it. Vincent hadn't looked up from the leather-bound book he was reading.

Harry browsed for five more minutes until he heard Vincent snap the book shut. He stood and said,

"Start a fire."

Harry frowned, "What if it spreads?"

Vincent gave him a look that made him feel like a fool. "That is the point. This is evil place. It should have been torched many years ago."

"No, I mean, what if it spreads to the woods?"

"It won't. It is too wet out there. I can feel it. It is snowing."

Harry didn't ask how he could feel the weather, much less from the basement. He did as he was asked and conjured a fire. he felt satisfied as the books were consumed, destroying the notes for thousands of no doubt horrid experiments.

As they walked slowly down the hall away from the fire, Vincent leading the way, Harry said, "Hojo is the man responsible for all of this, isn't he?"

"Yes, and I am going to find him and kill him."

Vincent led them to a rickety wooden staircase. He climbed first, Harry following slowly behind him. They emerged into one of the upper-level bedrooms. Harry was embarrassed to have assumed that this door led to a closet and not a secret staircase. He would have to be more thorough in the future.

It was getting dark outside, and a Tempus revealed that it was nearing 5. Soon he would need to go to the Strife's if he didn't want to miss dinner. But what to do about Vincent? He was reluctant to leave him alone. They had just met, but Harry could tell that Vincent had unresolved issues and probably shouldn't be left to his own devices for long periods of time.

Harry touched Vincent's sleeve and headed to the door, Vincent behind him. His feet made clicking sounds on the floor. He wore a pair of metal boots that looked like they belonged to a suit of armor.

Vincent was right; it _was _snowing outside. Harry turned to him and asked if he wanted to come with him to eat with his landlady. Vincent shook his head, "I do not require sustenance. My body survives off of the bacteria in the air."

"Okay…" wait, what the hell?

"I will roost in a tree for tonight. I would like to speak with you tomorrow before I leave on my mission. I require information about modern events."

Harry nodded. They both waited for the other to say or do something else, but neither of them made a move. Harry left. As he walked away, he realized that the creeping feeling he experienced earlier around the mansion was gone. It would appear that some part of him was aware of the atrocities in the basement and was now soothed by their destruction.

~000~

Scarlet concluded her presentation and returned to her seat to hear the President's reaction. Already her stomach was sinking. The President had an odd way of answering, as though he was only half-listening, when he was displeased. And immediately upon seeing Lazard, General Sephiroth, and her arrive his eyes had glazed over.

"So, uh, there you have it," she said, forcing herself to keep her hands still in her lap, "What do you think?"

"It was good, good," said the President, in a voice which made it plain that he had felt and understood nothing. "I admire the three of you pursuing this to its logical end. However, the company has a policy against all non-Mako products. I'm afraid I'll have to ask you to put this one to bed. Now, I have another meeting in a few minutes and need time to prepare. Good day to you."

And that was that. They were clearly dismissed. Scarlet felt like someone had reached inside of her and removed all of her organs. She nodded with the others and followed them out. In the hall outside she felt her throat begin to ache the way it always did before she was going to cry. She choked out a, "Well, we tried," to Lazard and Sephiroth and then made a hasty exit.

Safe in her office, she locked the door and sank to the floor, tears pouring down her cheeks. She knew that she shouldn't get so attached to her projects, but this one had been close to her heart. As a designer of weapons, it wasn't often that she got to do something that could do some good. To have the President reject a project that was obviously good for morale and the company's finances simply on principle upset her deeply.

There was a knock on her door. She started and then cleared her throat, wiping her cheeks with her sleeve.

"Who is it?"

"Turk Sinclair. You are invited to the Vice President's office immediately for a meeting. I am to escort you."

"…alright. I'm coming. Just give me a minute."

What did the President's son want with her? She'd never even spoken to him except to say congratulations when he was first promoted, and possibly Happy Christmas one year. She stood and straightened her blouse, making sure that it was properly tucked into her pencil skirt and that all the buttons were done. Next she took out her compact and wiped off the streaks of make-up. Her eyes were a tell-tale red, but there was nothing she could do about it on such short notice.

She opened the door. Sinclair turned out to be a very thin young man a head taller than her. Like all of the upper-level Turks, his features were perfectly non-descript. His eyes were as blank as a brick wall. He led the way to the elevators and pushed the button for the second-to-highest floor.

Scarlet hoped she was presentable enough.

In the bright polished elevator her reflection revealed a number of wayward wisps of hair that'd escaped her bun. Ignoring Sinclair, she removed the claw clip that held it in place and quickly twisted all of her hair together before coiling it at the back of her head and securing it in place. She felt much better with the plastic teeth of the comb once again restraining her hair.

Maybe Rufus Shinra wanted to meet her for a promotion, or perhaps to discuss her latest idea from the monthly board meeting.

Rufus' office was a huge white room. The windows were unadorned and let in huge floods of greenish sunlight. Thick white carpet muffled everything. She counted seven Turks ranged around the room in various positions.

She put on a professional smile and stepped up to Rufus' desk to shake his hand. His grip was firm and brief, the epitome of professionalism. He gestured for her to sit. He didn't smile, but he exuded solicitude. She was silently offered a selection of waters by a white-clad waiter that'd melted out of the wall. She accepted a bottle of sparkling water and allowed him to pour her a glass.

As this was proceeding Rufus said nothing. He looked so young and so mature at once, sitting there behind his big desk in his expensive grey suit.

She heard a faint sound and turned her head to see first Sephiroth and then Lazard enter, also escorted by Turks. Her eyes narrowed. They were also offered water. Lazard took a bottle of still water and Sephiroth shook his head. They were guided to seats on either side of Scarlet.

There was silence, and then Rufus suddenly smiled. He leaned forward and folded his hands on his desk.

"I am sure that you are all curious as to why you are here. Well, I admit freely to enjoying my privileges to the security cameras too much, and I was very impressed by your presentation earlier. I called you here to discuss implementing it when I replace my father."

Scarlet was too shocked to say anything. Lazard spoke, "I beg your pardon?"

"As you know, my father has not been well. His last stroke shook him badly, and although he refuses to even consider retirement at the present, he may not have a choice later. I have already taken the liberty of summoning the company lawyers to draw up a promissory contract. You of course understand that you must not mention this agreement to anyone."

Sephiroth was frowning beside her.

"Why not?"

Rufus smiled politely, "It would undermine company morale if my actions were misconstrued as a breach of solidarity. And the company's morale is very important to me. Ah, here they are."

A pair of black-clad men entered bearing heavy briefcases. They opened one on Rufus' desk and removed a master document and three copies for the signers to read.

Sephiroth finished first and leaned forward to sign his name at the bottom of the document. Scarlet didn't bother to finish reading her copy; if Sephiroth didn't find a problem with it, she sure as hell wasn't going to. Lazard had apparently come to the same conclusion because he signed immediately after her. They all shook hands with Rufus again, promised to keep the transaction secret, and were dismissed.

In the elevator there was silence. None of them knew if they should talk about what just happened. Sephiroth broke the silence.

"What is the point of a Vice President?" Sephiroth muttered, "I have never seen him do or hear him say much of anything."

"He doesn't seem to work, but that's his craftiness," Lazard responded. Scarlet saw a smirk twist Sephiroth's lips, as though Lazard had just brought up a private joke. For all she knew he had.

They parted ways. Back in her office, scarlet sank slowly into her chair and tried to process what had just happened. Her view of the way the company really functioned had changed once again. She didn't even know that the President was having strokes!

~000~

That night in his room Harry stayed up late reading the folders on Project S. It was a wonder that Sephiroth hadn't lost his mind if even half of what he was reading about had happened. To make matters worse, he found notes about future experiments to conduct that, if Hojo was still alive and functioning, he would be carrying out in the present. One of them was a program to breed Sephiroth and use the children's genes for injecting a new batch of SOLDIERS. If Hojo's theories were correct, Sephiroth's genes would result in a new and stronger brand of human.

He couldn't understand much of what he was reading, but he did notice that something called Jenova had been injected into Sephiroth since in utero and was the substance responsible for Sephiroth's radically-stronger abilities. This Jenova, whatever it was, made Sephiroth what he was. Harry resolved to find this Jenova, whatever it was, and destroy it. If he was reading the charts correctly, Jenova not only enhanced human strength and mental power but also destabilized the body's natural defenses against radical behavior. Hojo's notes referenced a number of experiments with Jenova cells that had resulted in disasters and heavy casualties of staff.

If the balance of Jenova cells was increased in Sephiroth or if he came in contact with the cells outside of an injection, he could lose his sanity and his control over his body. Harry felt sick at the thought. Why would Hojo inject Jenova cells into Sephiroth if they were so unstable? What was wrong with simple Mako?

When Harry was finished reading he deliberated what to do with the folders for a long time before he decided to burn them. No one should have access to this kind of personal information about Sephiroth. If it got into the wrong hands there could be a real disaster. According to the files, Sephiroth had the strength of ten men and nothing could ever change that.

He was just getting ready to go to sleep, if that was possible after what he'd been reading, when there was a knock on his door. he got out of bed and opened it. He was expecting it to be Constance, but found Cloud instead.

Cloud's eyes were downcast as usual, but after Harry asked him what it was he wanted, he looked up.

"I just wanted to say thank you for saving me the other night. I don't know how far they would have gone if you didn't scare them away."

Harry smiled gently and, after a moments indecision, smoothed a hand through Cloud's blond hair. "There's no need to thank me. I only did what was right. Good night, Cloud. I look forward to chopping wood with you tomorrow morning."

Cloud snorted and gave him a quick grin. "Okay. Good night."

Harry watched him pad down the hall, bemused. Cloud was a very shy boy, but he seemed to be warming to Harry. He was glad. It would be awkward to live under the same roof with a boy that refused to speak to him.

~000~

End Chapter Five

Harry doesn't know how to stay out of other people's business.


	6. Chapter 6

A/N: Typo! Harry is supposed to be going under the name Desmond, but I forgot. Constance calls him Harry in chapter 5. Sorry about that!

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter Six

~000~

The next morning at breakfast Constance said,

"ShinRa Mansion burnt to ground last night."

"Oh, how awful," Harry responded mildly, hiding his smile behind his mug. From the keen way she was watching him, he knew that she suspected something. He had told her that he was going to explore it after all. He didn't think that she would tell anyone, but she might want a favor for her silence. "I hope no one was hurt."

"No one hurt. Mansion far from town, and the fire no spread. Ground too wet."

"Well that's a relief," Harry took a bite of toast. There was more food on the table today. He was relieved. It meant that she had decided to trust him, and could afford to eat more of their stock because she knew that she could replenish it. On that line of thought, Harry asked, "Tell me, what sort of meat do you like to eat in this region?"

She pursed his lips, thinking, "We like…reindeer, and wolf, and goat, and…rabbit. Rabbit is good when cooked long time."

Harry nodded, "Alright. Is there some kind of rule against hunting them without permission?"

She shook her head, "No. Anyone can hunt. Anyone can get killed chasing wolves for revenge, too. We no care if you stupid and get killed. No grave marker for fools."

Cloud huffed and frowned at his mother. She gave him a challenging look. He stuck out his tongue and she smacked the back of his head, snapping something in their rough language. Cloud sniggered and Constance smirked at him in triumph. Harry watched this exchange with fascination. It was still hard for him to believe that they were mother and son and not siblings. The way they communicated was done mostly in gestures, most of which he didn't understand. Cloud seemed to treat his mother as an equal rather than an authority figure, but respected her wishes when she told him to do something.

They were very loyal to each other.

"I am going out today and won't be back until dinner. Is that alright?" he stood, tucking in a wayward shirt tail, "I've finished off the tree for firewood, and will happily chop you some more tomorrow."

Constance nodded, "Yes, you go. But no burning down forest."

Harry choked on his last mouthful of tea. Cloud looked puzzled, obviously not understanding his mother's reference. Constance winked at Harry and stood to put away the plates. Harry just shook his head and went to get dressed. Today he was going to try to find a dragon to fight, and on the way perhaps some meat for Constance's pantry. He resolutely did not think about anything that'd happened the day before. A sort of numbness had come over him in the night.

He put on warm clothes and boots. It was 8:30 when he set out. It was icy cold but beautiful, sunshine and a pastel blue sky. The Nibel Mountains were beautiful.

First he passed through the town, looking for someone who made outerwear. His gloves were badly damaged by the acid blood from the monster he fought the day before, and he was anxious to replace them. On the way he passed a group of men standing close together arguing about something. He would have ignored them if one of the men hadn't stated that if they did not find a way to dig a new well that wouldn't freeze this year they were going to have a very hard time feeding their goats.

His Saving People thing woke with a vengeance. All Harry had time to think about was that he wasn't aware that they had domesticated goats so high as it swept him into a plan to help these poor farmers. He supposed he shouldn't be surprised about the goats. Goats were good at climbing rocky places, right?

He backtracked and coughed to get their attention. Three sets of eyes blinked at him. He was once again acutely aware that he was an outsider. He had not known these men since he was in his mother's womb, and therefore he was scum. He lifted his chin. So what? He could help them. No, he _would _help them.

"I dig wells."

They didn't react, so Harry went on.

"I can dig your well for you. Just tell me where you want it."

The tallest, fattest man peered at him with sharp blue eyes for a long time and then smacked his lips. "Yes. You dig well for me. Come with me, short man."

Harry went. He was led to a farmhouse cut into the side of the mountain with a thick range of evergreens about it to protect it from the wind and snow drifts. There was a barn nearby, and he could hear the bleating of the goats before he was shown inside. In the center of the sizable barn was a hole in the ground. The man, still nameless, pointed at the hole.

"It dry up. You dig deeper. I pay you two deer, fat ones."

Harry sighed. He was hoping to start from scratch, not try to fix an old well. A sensing charm usually allowed him to find a local source of groundwater to tap, which helped him know how deep to dig. Digging was easy, the water less so. He silently cast the charm and was disappointed to see his fears confirmed. The water had shifted in a new direction. The nearest well he could dig would be a five minute walk from the barn.

One look at the goat farmer told him that there was no way he could get out of his agreement.

Harry disliked playing god, but sometimes it was necessary. He allowed himself to be armed with a shovel and bucket and lowered into the well. Once down there he began moving the ground lining the nearest water source bit by bit, guiding the water closer and closer to the barn. It took him several hours, during which time he had to dig to keep up appearances.

Great drops of sweat fell continually into his eyes. His temples ached from the sheer concentration his task required. But finally the water was beneath the well again. A few buckets of dirt later had first mud and then trickles of water sucking at his boots. He dug faster, sitting in his harness to avoid getting swallowed up by the water as it began to bubble up. Its pressure increased and then suddenly the well was filling up. He jerked on the rope and was pulled to safety just in time. The water reached his neck halfway up the well before he was pulled out of it.

He was soaked to the skin when he emerged. The dour farmer's face split into a shocking grin. Harry didn't know that the man knew what a smile was. Harry was wrapped in a woolen blanket and embraced.

"You dig good, short man! So fast!"

Harry endured the embrace, smiling despite the insult to his height. Everyone looked short to these mountain men!

He was taken to the farmhouse, put in a hot bath, and then allowed to put on an old set of clothes that once belonged to the farmer's son, now grown with a family of his own. He was planted beside the fire until his hair was completely dry, the farmer gray-haired wife bustling around doing something complicated with wool. When he was dry he was allowed to go outside and collect his reward.

Harry was loaned a sled with the promised deer tied to it and sent on his way without ceremony. The numbness from that morning had spread to his limbs. His hands felt clumsy and big, his feet blocks of wood.

He walked slowly back to the Strife's. The sled was heavy behind him after his strenuous morning of chopping wood and digging for hours the well. His head still ached terribly, though the bath had helped soothe him somewhat. As he walked he thought unwillingly about that claustrophobic little room in the labs filled with all of those experiments. He wondered if Project A was Angeal. He remembered that the folder was very thin, so he had dismissed it at the time as one of the lesser experiments on human mutation. But perhaps he had been wrong. And who was Project G? Could that be the Commander Genesis Rhapsodos that Angeal mentioned during their conversation?

If so, perhaps he had been hasty in his decision to help Vincent destroy the notes. But there was something about Vincent that hampered Harry's natural independence. He couldn't quite put his finger on what it was, but it felt sort of like how he imagined a house cat would feel in the presence of a lion. Disobedience was not an option.

Perhaps Vincent had had the right idea after all, though. Harry knew that he could never look at Sephiroth the same again, knowing what he knew. And what if Hojo had returned and used his folders for further experiments? No, it was better that they were destroyed before any more evil was done with them.

He stomped down on his thoughts after he reached that conclusion. He didn't want to think about yesterday. He didn't even want to think about why he didn't want to think about it. Something made him shy away from it.

It was just after noon when he arrived at the Strife's. He realized that he had inadvertently contradicted himself and showed up for lunch. He hoped there was enough food for him, because he was starving.

Constance must have seen him coming up the road because she opened the door and came charging out. She let out a loud exclamation when she saw the deer, covering her mouth with her hands. Her eyes were wide with delight and pleasure. She took away her hands and exclaimed,

"Where you get? Where you get? They so big! So fat!"

Harry caught his breath and replied, "I dug a well, and this was my payment. Do you have room for these in the pantry?"

"Oh yes, yes. I make room. Come inside and get warm! Cloud work. He home from school early today. Snow storm coming soon."

Harry was suddenly very glad that he had come home early, or else he would have had no way of knowing. He hoped Vincent would be alright, and then smacked himself. Damn it! He was supposed to meet Vincent! If he hadn't so studiously avoided thinking about yesterday he would have remembered!

He excused himself, asking that Constance put aside some bread or something for him to eat. She frowned, looking worried, but said she would, and told him to hurry back.

He sprinted down the road, anxiety giving him strength. What if something had happened to Vincent while he was away? Vincent looked like he could handle himself, but he _was _extremely strange and possibly out of his mind. It was easier to think of him that way when they were apart. He knew that the moment he saw him again he would once again feel dominated by the will of a higher being. One of these days he would figure out why that was.

Sure enough, the evergreens surrounding the ShinRa Mansion were singed. The garden was blackened, and there was nothing but a choppy façade where some of the bricks remained and a deep pit left where the house had been. He was glad at the sight. Now no one could do horrible things to people in that basement anymore.

There was a sound like a gust of wind, and then Vincent's low voice said,

"Hello, Desmond. You are late."

Harry shrieked and leapt away. Vincent scared him. He turned red and rubbed the back of his head, humiliated. His earlier fears were confirmed. He felt like a child bound to the will of his parent. Vincent just looked at him in that blank way he had. He really did look like a Vampire, only not as sickly.

"I'm sorry I was late," Harry gasped out, "I just forgot. I didn't get a lot of sleep last night and then I had to do this thing…"

"You dug a well for meat."

"I…Yes. How did you know that?"

"I followed you. I know you read Sephiroth's files, and I wanted to see what you would do. I am glad that you destroyed them. I would have killed you if you did not. You will tell no one what you read, or I will find you and kill you."

"Ah."

Well then. That explained some of his unconscious submissiveness around Vincent. Perhaps his survival senses knew that Vincent was the kind of person that killed people when they did things they weren't supposed to. To distract himself from that unpleasant thought, he asked,

"So, uh, what did you want to talk to me about?"

Vincent strode past Harry into the destroyed ShinRa property. Harry followed. As he walked, Vincent said, "I wanted you to come with me to the Reactor. The journal I read said that Hojo stored extra experiments there that required more Mako to develop."

"Oh." Harry came to a stop, "In that case, do you mind if we pause for a moment so that I can go and eat my lunch? It won't take long. I'm just very hungry and will need my strength if we really are going to brave a snow storm all the way to the Reactor. I may also need to buy supplies for the journey."

"Ah, the snow storm," Vincent murmured. "Perhaps we should wait until after the snow. I will accompany you and wait with you until the snow has passed. I could move through it without difficulty, but I want you close at hand when I breach the reactor and will not risk your life on the journey."

"Thank…you?" This was a nice break from the death threats.

Vincent gave him a short nod and promptly began marching back the way they'd come. Harry sighed and followed, his stomach growling.

"Why do you want me to come with you?" Harry asked, more to break the silence than out of curiosity. Vincent did not slow, and Harry had to trot to keep up with him. Vincent was very tall. "Don't get me wrong. I am happy to go with you. I would just like to know what _your _reasons are."

"I suspect Jenova is stored in the Reactor."

Harry skidded to a halt. Vincent paused when he realized that Harry was no longer in step with him. He turned and raised a thin black eyebrow. "Do you need to rest?"

"I…no. No. I was just surprised," Harry began to walk again. "Why can't you be alone with Jenova, whatever it is?"

"I cannot face Jenova alone because _she _is inside of me. I do not know how strong she is, so I will not risk allowing her to gain possession of my mind. I have enough beings fighting for it as it is."

Harry decided not to pursue that line of thought. Vincent was a very strange man, and the details of his strangeness were his business. Harry did not want to know the details.

"So Jenova is a woman?"

"She is an alien; an evil creature. She craves death. It is her sustenance. I must kill her before she can rise and destroy this world and all that is in it."

Harry shivered a little. Vincent definitely had a flair for the dramatic. He was almost sorry he'd asked despite his own strong feelings of distaste for Jenova. Those feelings only intensified now that he knew that she not simply a dangerous chemical substance but an actual malignant being. Anything that inhibited free will rubbed him the wrong way. Well, unless that thing was Vincent. He kind of liked Vincent, actually, even though just being in his presence made him want to assume the position of a supplicant.

Constance was helping Cloud pack the deer into their pantry when Harry and Vincent arrived. She stared at Vincent. Vincent looked stoically back, his collar covering his mouth and his hair whipping in the wind. He looked like something out of a book, not a real person.

"Harry, you bring friend?"

Harry stuffed his hands in his pockets, "Yes. Sorry. Ah. He will sleep with me. I will pay for him to stay, if you agree to let him."

Constance finished with the deer and shooed Cloud inside. Cloud went slowly and reluctantly, obviously longing to be included in the grown-ups discussion. Constance tutted at him and he finally slipped inside. Harry could see his little face peeping out the window at them.

"I no care if he stay a few days. How you fit together in bed?"

Harry opened his mouth but Vincent beat him to it.

"I will sleep on the floor, ma'am. I prefer it."

Constance looked with disbelief between the two of them. They both knew that the floor became sub-zero at night. Harry took pity on her and lied, "Vincent is a monk. To deny himself pleasure is part of his devotion to his god. He eats very little and does not speak unless it is required. I hope that this does not upset you."

This appeared to calm Constance, "No, I not upset. I am very respectful of holy man. He may do as he likes."

Harry smiled, relieved, and she smiled thinly back. She barked at him that his food was getting cold, so he hurried inside. Cloud sprang guiltily away from the window when he entered. Harry sent him a wink and Cloud flushed, disappearing into the bedroom he shared with his mother.

His food was cold already, but he didn't mind. He offered some to Vincent purely out of habit and then set about devouring it like a starved animal. Now that he was sitting still he became aware that his entire body ached. He found himself wanting a nap, and told Vincent so. Vincent said that he would be alright without him and let Harry sleep.

~000~

Her name was Ophelia Riversedge. Arsinoe had been brunette and tall, an athlete in her youth. Ophelia was quite the opposite. Petite and pale, she looked like a bird given human form. Her thinness didn't have the air of contrivance that the society women did, though. She had simply been born thin, with slender bones that made her look girlish. Narrow wrists, wasp waist.

Her wide eyes hadn't stopped staring at him since he entered the hotel room. He didn't know what exactly it was that was drawing this reaction; he was wearing civilian clothes to make her more comfortable, and had looped his famous hair back and tied it up in a tight bun at the back of his head. He'd learned it in Wutai and usually wore his hair this way at home.

"Are you uncomfortable?"

She shook her head slowly, pale eyes still staring. She did not speak. Was she mute? Sephiroth didn't think that Hojo would 'mate' him with girls with disabilities, but perhaps she had lost it in an accident and was otherwise perfect.

"Forgive me; I do not wish to be insensitive, but we only have two hours to accomplish this."

Hojo's funding had been cut again recently to pay for a new ShinRa monument to display the continuing artificial youth and vigor of their President. The very fact that such a monument was required was a statement to the contrary, but no one seemed to realize that.

Sephiroth was lucky that they weren't doing this in his apartment or worse, one of the labs.

He decided to take the initiative. Ophelia was obviously the passive type and required a leader. He began to unbutton his shirt. He slipped it off his shoulders and laid it on the chair beside the bed. Next he sat and began to unlace his shoes. Ophelia watched him. Then she slowly raised her hands to begin undoing the buttons down the front of her blouse. She wore a matching lavender blouse and skirt, and pretty green shoes and stockings. She looked like a flower.

He removed his trousers and got into bed wearing his pants. He would have removed them, but he didn't wish to make her uncomfortable. She was already very red in the face and now avoiding his eyes. On impulse he reached out and caught her hand as she moved to remove her necklace. It was a small silver heart on a chain, girlish and too young for a woman her age.

"Ophelia."

She looked up and met his eyes. This time her stare was not blank or vague. It was frightened and anxious. He felt something go soft inside of him. He did his best to smile. She smiled shakily back and allowed him to pull her onto the bed and close enough to nestle against his side. Woman or not, she could pass for a child with her build. The observant part of him noted that although he liked that she was smaller than him, he preferred Arsinoe's bolder personality. He didn't want someone that was too afraid to act on their own or do something that might not work out perfectly.

"Don't be afraid of me, Ophelia. I am here for the same reason you are. I will not mistreat you or be rough with you. Trust me."

She was tense for a few more minutes but he noticed that she was gradually softening against him. Then she looked up and met his eyes. He kissed her. It was not necessary for the breeding, but he wanted to comfort her. He did not know if he could live with himself if he was rough with a young woman when there was another alternative.

When they parted she spoke for the first time.

"You are not what I expected. You are kind. I thought that you would be a hard man, doing what you did in the War."

He didn't like being reminded of the Wutai War, but he only nodded and kissed her again. After several minutes of this he helped her undress and slip under the covers with him. He disposed of his pants and made sure she was comfortable and prepared before he did what was required of him.

Genesis' pills were still necessary, but this affair wasn't as repellent as the last one. He didn't think that he was going to mind too much doing this every night of the week until she was pregnant.

~000~

Two days later a text arrived just as he was putting on his coat to go home.

_Ophelia Riversedge is no longer available. _

_Your meetings are cancelled until we can find a replacement. _

_Signed, Dr. Hojo_

He frowned. He had taken extra pains with Ophelia, and he was positive that she had reached orgasm at one point. He wondered what had come up to make her reconsider. Out of curiosity he called Andre, one of the aides in the labs who sometimes gave Sephiroth random information if he asked nicely. Genesis said it was because Andre had a crush on him, but Sephiroth wasn't entirely sure what that meant so he ignored Genesis' remarks.

Andre answered and sounded pleased to hear from him, as usual.

"Ophelia? That's a pretty name. Hm…let me just check…while I'm looking it up, tell me, how are you? I saw you got to go to the Crater last week. Is it nice there? I've always wanted to go. I haven't seen snow since I was a kid, you know. I miss it. Midgar is so stuffy, and the air after a snow is always so refreshing…"

Sephiroth had found that Andre often managed to have entire conversations without Sephiroth ever needing to say anything other than, "Oh really?"

Andre's stream of chatter trailed off. "Oh. Sephiroth? Are you still there?"

"Yes, I am."

"Uh, it says here in my log that she went mad and drowned herself last night. Her body is still being autopsied, actually. Was she a friend of yours? I am so sorry!"

"No, no, it's alright," Sephiroth switched to auto-pilot, the larger part of his mind focusing on why Ophelia would have done something like that and why it was in the science logs. "I only met her once, but I heard something and wanted to see if it was true. I guess she really did kill herself."

"Yeah…so listen, are you busy tonight?"

"Unfortunately yes," Sephiroth could've kicked himself and scrambled to find an excuse, "Because…I…am…meeting Commander Hewley for a dinner meeting that cannot be missed. I am so sorry Andre. One of these days our schedules will be compatible."

Andre gave a little sigh, "I suppose. Oh shit, the boss is here. Bye!"

There was a click as he hung up. Sephiroth sat back in his chair. He felt shocked and confused, and uncomfortable. Was he responsible in some way for this? He abandoned his plans to go home and turned his computer back on. It was easy to hack the system and find information on her. He frowned. She worked for the company. Or she had.

Ophelia Riversedge was 25 years old and worked as a typist in the Department of Urban Development. Her family was listed as one brother named John. They were born and bred Midgarians. Her brother was also listed as a dependent, with a fatal health condition.

A peek at her financial records showed that they were not good prior to the addition of a hefty sum of money from the Department of Science. Sephiroth's brows drew together. Was that what she was paid to bear his children? It was much more than he was expecting. No wonder Hojo was worried about funding all the time.

Her genetics were discovered when she went in for her physical at the company clinic. Shortly afterward she was approached by a representative of the Science Department and asked if she would be willing to use her womb for science.

He still couldn't see why she would commit suicide. Her decision to work with Hojo solved her financial burdens and made it possible for her brother to die comfortably with pain medication. He looked up John Riversedge in the general database out of curiosity and knew immediately as soon as he read the article that appeared on his screen. John was killed by a taxi yesterday afternoon.

He had no family, so he was in no position to make theories, but he guessed that Ophelia was very close with her brother and took his death badly.

Regardless of the reasons for her actions, he was upset.

Just before he turned off his computer again he searched for her medical records and saw that the results of her autopsy had been posted. He skimmed the results and then stopped short. He closed his eyes. She had been pregnant.

Now he had one child growing and another one dead.

He turned off his computer and headed out. It was late now, and he was the last one on the floor. As he passed Angeal's office he decided to call him. He suddenly did not want to spend his evening alone.

~000~

Angeal met him at his apartment for dinner. He smiled and held up a six-pack of non-alcoholic beer. Sephiroth had not been completely successful at hiding his state of mind over the PHS, it would seem. Though it held no intoxicating properties, non-alcoholic beer was a sort of safe zone for them to communicate. Both would pretend that neither remembered what the other had said the next morning, and hold no grudges no matter what was said.

"What's for dinner?"

Sephiroth gestured grandly to the same meal he ate every Tuesday night laid out on the table, "I made it especially for you."

"Oh my," Angeal bent to unlace his boots and left them neatly by the door. "I don't deserve a friend like you. Here, have a beer."

Sephiroth opened it and took a large drink of it. The sheer pleasure of drinking something that had no nutritional value and would piss off Hojo was a balm to his soul. They sat and began to eat. Angeal didn't ask why he was unexpectedly invited to dinner and Sephiroth didn't tell him. They talked about Genesis instead.

Things were coming to a head with his protégé Clovis. The tests for entry into Third Class were coming up soon, and Genesis seemed confident that Clovis would pass. But just to give Clovis a little more experience thinking on his feet, he had taken him with him on his latest mission to investigate reports of a large unknown monster terrorizing a town near Kalm.

They finished eating and moved to Sephiroth's pristine sofa. It was rarely used, and still had some of the stiffness of newly-purchased furniture. Sephiroth had owned it for five years. He didn't usually meet his friends at home.

Angeal handed him his second beer and settled into his corner of the sofa, boldly resting his ankles on Sephiroth's thigh. Sephiroth didn't mind, and laid his hands on them.

"So let's talk about something else. Is there something on your mind?" 

Sephiroth shook his head, "No. Yes. I don't want to talk about it. I just don't want to be alone tonight."

"I see. Hm…what to talk about…oh, did I tell you? Jeremy in accounts hit on me. I couldn't believe it! I was polite of course, but I had to turn him down. It would never work. I don't know about you, but I just have trouble connecting with people that aren't fighters of some kind. That's why things worked so well between Jane and I for a while. She was only a boxer, but she knew how I felt."

Sephiroth nodded, "It would be nice to see Jane again. It's too bad she moved."

"Agreed. Seph, let me know if I'm being too forward, but have you been seeing anyone lately? I ask because genesis told me you've been using his emergency pills for something but you won't tell him what. I'm just a little concerned."

"I have been seeing someone, several someones, but not in the way you mean. Hojo has decided to breed me."

Angeal choked on his beer, "You're kidding!"

"No," Sephiroth met his eyes, "I'm not. One of them is already pregnant. I don't know how long I'm going to have to do this."

"That's…oh, Seph. I can't believe it. Hojo has done some sick things to all of us, but this takes the cake. You're a person, not a…you know, an animal. Do you have any choice in this?"

"No. I want to refuse, but I can't. Angeal, it upsets me. These women are strangers, and they're afraid of me. I know that people find me intimidating, frightening even, but I don't like thinking about it. I feel like a monster."

"Well, this might not be good advice, but I think it would help you to go out and try to balance Hojo's control by doing things that you want to do. If he's forcing you to have sex with women you don't want to have sex with, why not also go out and have sex with women you _do _want to have sex with? Or a man, if that is your preference. Does that make sense?"

Sephiroth nodded thoughtfully, "That is a different way of thinking about it. How do I know whether I want a man or a woman?"

Angeal shrugged, "I'm no expert, but I just sort of go with the flow. You never know where you're going to meet people or when the mood will strike you. For instance, remember our last mission to the Northern Crater?"

"Yes, of course. What about it?" he began to rub his thumbs against Angeal's ankles to soothe them. He rarely felt pain personally, but he knew that it was common for others to experience aches and pains in their joints.

Angeal turned a little red, "Remember the young man that served us dinner?"

Sephiroth did remember him. His name was Harry. He remembered thinking that he was attractive. And then he realized what Angeal was telling him. "You slept with him? He was the one in your room that morning?"

Angeal bit his lip and nodded, "Yeah. We had a conversation after dinner, and then we kissed for a bit, but he had to go do something. I thought that would be it and I was disappointed because…well, you remember what he looked like. You don't see people like that every day. The next morning he knocks on my door, and we ended up in bed together. You know that I normally have affairs with women, but I gave him my PHS number. He never called, but I really wanted him to. He had such an interesting voice. It was like music."

Sephiroth didn't respond. He was confused by a sudden black emotion building in the pit of his stomach. His hands had gone cold, and a sort of grey fog descended over his consciousness. What was wrong with him? He felt angry with Angeal, but why? Was it because he'd slept with Harry? They were consenting adults. They were free to do as they liked.

He took a hefty gulp of beer and wished that it was alcoholic. He needed a drink.

"Sorry, I kind of trailed off the subject there," Angeal smiled self-consciously, "I guess that you should experiment. Go on a walk, and look at people. See what you like. And then go for it. The worst that could happen is they'll say no. and there's always the chance that they'll say yes."

"That sounds logical."

"That's because it is," Angeal joked. "Live a little. You work too damn hard."

"That's rich coming from you," Sephiroth teased, pinching Angeal's ankle. The fog was starting to recede, but thoughts of Harry had swelled to replace it. He had only seen him once, but he had made an impression. Angeal was right. You didn't see people that looked like that in real life very often.

They finished their beers and talked about flirting. Sephiroth was positive that he would be bad at it. He was too straight-forward. Angeal insisted that some people liked that and hated beating around the bush.

It was eleven when they said goodnight. Angeal pretended to stagger to the door, and Sephiroth laughed quietly. He was never one to make large displays of emotion. It didn't come naturally.

When Angeal was gone he sat on the sofa and thought. Then he stood and stretched his arms high above his head. He was going to take a walk and take a look.

~000~

The snow storm was supposed to blow over in a few days. It remained for two weeks, and counting; the snow piled up high on all side of the little Strife house, insulating it from the wind.

The snow did not blow steadily, but came and went in fits and bursts. The storm was more wind that snow. The wind came in fierce gusts and blew great clouds of snow high into the air, carrying it where it pleased. The evergreens were heavy with it.

Harry was beginning to feel like he was a prisoner. He only left the house to fetch snow for melting and to replenish their firewood. He longed to risk his life and brave the snow to take a walk, but it just wasn't safe. He could easily walk off a cliff and never know it. His life meant more to him than such a foolish death.

The numbness he felt had gradually faded, but it lingered still, and even when he tried he found that he could not clearly remember the events of the day he met Vincent.

It was after noon, and Constance was in her room weaving. Cloud was with her, studying presumably. Vincent and Harry sat in the arm chairs on either side of the fire. Harry was whittling something for Cloud out of wood. He hadn't decided what it would be yet, but he was leaning toward a Nibel wolf.

Vincent was dozing. Vincent slept a lot, Harry noticed. They rarely spoke. Harry was torn between wanting to ask him questions and not wanting to. He wasn't sure he wanted to know the answers to everything he was wondering.

He paused in his whittling to stretch his fingers, frowning at the cold feeling at their tips. He wished that the feeling would go away. What was wrong with him? He hadn't been right since that day at the Mansion.

Vincent stirred as he watched. Harry kept his eyes on him, wondering if he was waking or merely dreaming. Vincent's shot open as though he was startled. Harry sprang back. His eyes were yellow. The yellow was somehow more horrible than the red. The red was merely odd. This yellow…it made something freeze inside Harry.

Vincent stood and reached out his clawed hand for Harry's throat. Harry dodged and grabbed his sword, only to find that Vincent's eyes were once again red. He looked angry, but not at Harry. He met Harry's eyes and said,

"Put on your coat. Sit outside on the steps. I need to be away from you for a little bit."

It was not a suggestion. Harry did as he was told and stood outside. He cast a warming charm and watched the elements swirl. As he was standing there, a realization like a hammer to the head hit him.

He was in shock. He had been in shock since the monster almost killed him.

He sat down heavily and put his aching head in his hands. It was as though gates inside of his mind had been opened and he could think clearly again. He had been functioning without thinking deeply about anything at all for weeks now. Who knew how much longer he would have continued to do so if the altercation with Vincent didn't shock him out of it?

It was more than the near-death. The news that Sephiroth was not entirely human, that he lived in a laboratory as an experiment until he was assigned to the militia at age 13, that he too had spent his youth fighting a fight he was not responsible for, had hit him hard. It hit him much harder than he wanted to acknowledge before because it forced him to acknowledge that he had feelings for a man he had only seen once before, a man who might never return them. A man who might not know how to return someone's feelings at all.

He wondered what he could have been thinking all this time. Who did he think he was? Sephiroth was a stranger. What right did Harry have to interfere with his life, for good or evil?

But Sephiroth had no idea what danger he was in. He didn't know that Jenova existed, much less what she could do to him. No, Harry had no choice as a decent person but to kill her. If Vincent contained her cells, who knew who else also lived with her inside of them simply waiting to use them as a puppet to her will? Regardless of the consequences, he would do his best to destroy her.

Beyond Jenova, he needed to think seriously about how he was going to establish a proper past for himself. Saying he was from Kalm when his voice said differently was not an option.

As soon as the winter was over, he needed to head to the nearest port and get passage to Kalm. He would live there as long as it took for him to learn how to mimic their mannerisms and accent perfectly. He didn't relish the prospect of learning another language, but it was necessary. Once he had made a convincing past, he could think about how to approach ShinRa.

Maybe he could get an office job to avoid potentially getting injected in the military. He didn't know how his body would react. He would talk to Vincent about it; maybe there was a way to get an injection in the black market and see what happened in private.

He sat outside thinking for a long time. He stood when his legs fell asleep and walked around the house, staying close so that he wouldn't get lost. the wind whipped at his exposed nose and bloodied it. His blood stained the snow bright red. He hurried inside and hoped that he'd allowed Vincent enough time alone.

Vincent was crouching by the fire growling something low at the flames when Harry entered. Vincent turned and stared at the blood streaming down Harry's front. For a moment yellow flickered in his eyes and his body jerked forward; Harry thought for sure that he was going to attack him again. But then Vincent seemed to regain control of himself and courteously helped Harry locate a handkerchief to hold against his nose.

"I appreciate your understanding."

Harry smiled, "It's no trouble." His voice came out nasally, and he saw what he swore was amusement flit past Vincent's lips.

"Again, thank you."

They returned to their seats, Harry feeling alive for the first time since the Mansion. He decided to be brave.

"Vincent?"

"Hm?"

"What did you do before you got locked in that coffin?"

"I was a security guard."

"Oh." That was much less glamorous and mysterious than Harry was expecting. Perhaps he was lying. He would never be able to tell. Vincent's face was as telling as a rock. "Well, when you were out and living in the world, were you aware of any way to get access to Mako injections outside the military?"

"They inject the military with Mako?"

Ah. Perhaps Vincent would not be quite so helpful with current information. He would find out for himself when he got to Kalm, if this winter ever ended.

~000~

Sephiroth took a stroll through the streets. He wore his hair up and a hooded sweat shirt Angeal loaned him years ago and continued to forget to ask for back. Sephiroth had no intention of returning it unless asked directly, which he knew Angeal would never do.

He tried to be critical but open to new things at once, but still came up with nothing. He could find something wrong with every person he saw. They were too old, too tall, too short, too unhealthy, too thin, or simply wrong.

He began to get discouraged and headed below the Plate. He wasn't intending to look there, merely take his usual walk along the service corridors of the Reactor.

He walked until midnight and then headed back up. He felt no more resolved then than he had before. He didn't know what that negative emotion he'd felt when Angeal was there was, or why it chose then to surface. He thought that it might be jealousy, but that would mean that he considered Harry his in some way, and that was simply not true. People weren't objects and couldn't belong to other people.

Now that finding someone attractive was not going to happen, he thought about Angeal's other suggestion. What was something he wanted to do but hadn't done before?

Just then he saw the library in the distance. It was next to Midgar University, and open 24 hours. He had always wanted to go inside and find a book or two to read for hours undisturbed. He had read a lot as a child in the laboratories, but those had mostly been technical manuals. The closest he got to fiction were the traditional stories he learned in cultural studies so that he could understand the native backgrounds of different countries when he arrived to do whatever it was ShinRa wanted him to do.

The hours of reading might not be undisturbed, but he could still go inside and have a look.

He stepped inside. It was a new building; it was built three years ago in a publicity stunt to display that ShinRa cared about education. Sephiroth knew for a fact that they did not, but he wasn't going to tattle on them. What would be the point?

There were students grouped by the computer bank, some typing furiously and others looking half-asleep as they clicked through articles. Otherwise the building was abandoned. Sephiroth headed toward the Adult section and browsed through the shelves. He had never seen so many books together in one place. He knew that this was what libraries were for, but he had never been inside one. It was new to him.

He picked out a fictionalized book on the history of Wutai and then put it back. He didn't want to read something that contained useful information. He wanted to read something simply for the pleasure of it. But he didn't want to read something cheaply written or trite.

After a few minutes of aimless wandering he became aware that there was someone nearby. He peeked around the shelf and saw the back of a young man with a cart. He was replacing them on the shelves. Sephiroth approached.

"Excuse me."

The man turned. Sephiroth liked him immediately. He was just the right height and looked healthy as a horse. Sephiroth couldn't stand people that looked sickly, whether it showed in their weight or their general appearance. It came from his childhood in the labs when he would sometimes glimpse a horribly deformed creature in a cage and was told that viruses did the damage.

He smelled of smoke, oranges and coffee. And he was beautiful. Sephiroth liked looking at him. There was symmetry to his face that he found soothing. The young man smiled with more than politeness (not that Sephiroth knew the difference), and asked if he needed help finding something.

"Yes, but I'm not sure what I'm looking for."

He laughed with a sudden quick laugh, showing his teeth and wrinkling his nose. "Well, that's not something I hear every day. I presume you are looking for a book, at least?"

"Yes, a book that is not educational. I want a good book to read in the evenings that will take me a while to finish."

"Hm…well, I can show you some books that _I _liked and we can go from there. How does that sound?"

"That sounds fine." Sephiroth followed him to a different section and listened intently to his description of what sounded like a mystery. He tucked it under his arm for consideration. The librarian told him about three different books, all from different genres, before he asked, "Oh, by the way, what's your name?"

"I'm Sephiroth. You are?"

"I'm Ernest. It's nice to meet you. Do people mistake you for the General a lot?"

Sephiroth frowned, readjusting his armful of books, "I _am _the General."

Ernest paused, turned, and gave him a long look from head to toe. And then he took a quick step back, his eyes going wide. "Oh my god you _are!"_

They stood there for a tense moment before Ernest smiled and laughed a little, "Wow, I am an idiot for not noticing before. I guess I normally just see you with your hair down in the posters, and without it I just thought you were an unusually tall handsome man."

Sephiroth tucked the compliment away. Ernest thought he was handsome?

"You're not an idiot. I'm in disguise. Most people make the same mistake you did. Don't tell anyone, but that's why I keep my hair so long. It is my most distinguishing feature, other than the Masamune."

"You are right. I never thought about it that way. Oh well. I guess you are a General, so you must be good at tactics and chess and things like that. It figures. It's really cool to meet you. I've never met a celebrity before."

Sephiroth smiled his small smile, "I'm a celebrity?"

"Yeah! Ha, okay, back to business. Are any of those going to work out for you?"

"I will take all of them. May I have a bag?"

Ernest gave him a look, and then seemed to realize something, "You don't have a card, do you?"

"I need a card?"

"Just come with me; we'll make you one in no time."

They chatted in whispers about books Ernest had read as they walked past the computer banks and to the check-out desks by the door. There was a young woman asleep behind one of them. Ernest edged around her and seated himself at the desk at the far end, which had a convenient stool in front of it for visitors. Sephiroth sat and set the books on the desk.

"So protocol requires me to see proof that you live here, but I don't think that's necessary. We both know you live here. I do have to see I.D. just in case you're a really convincing imposter, though."

Sephiroth dug out his ShinRa keycard and handed it over. Ernest looked impressed as he looked it over. After a moment he exclaimed,

"You're only twenty-four?"

"Yes?"

"I'm older than you! I can't…wow. You've already won a war, and I'm working in a library for the hell of it."

"What do you mean?"

Ernest pointed to the sleeping girl, "Karen there is technically the one on duty, but I have trouble sleeping so I usually cover her shift for her. Don't tell on me. I like it here at night. I can do busy work or read to my heart's content."

Sephiroth got an idea. He wasn't completely positive, but he thought that Ernest might be flirting with him just a little bit. "So you could theoretically leave any time you wanted to?"

"That's correct," he punched something into the system, and a machine began printing information on a square rectangle of plastic. He looked up and met Sephiroth's eyes. "Why?"

"No reason in particular. I was just thinking of going out for a late-night snack and was wondering if you wanted to come with me, or have me get you something if you don't want to wake your friend."

Ernest kept his composure admirably, but his ears turned pink, betraying him. "Oh," he choked out, "That would be really nice. I would love to go with you."

They went. Sephiroth took Ernest's suggestion to go to a local diner that catered to college students. They sat at a small table in the corner, and Ernest did most of the talking. Sephiroth liked that he could fill the silence without irritating him.

He was a student at Midgar University and was studying World History. His parents had been wealthy and left him a hefty yearly stipend. Ernest wasn't sure what to do with it and didn't want to jump into a career just to have something to do, so he was studying while he figured himself out.

Sometime during their chat Ernest started to give him these looks. Sephiroth liked them, but wasn't sure if he was reading them correctly. He thought that Ernest was attracted to him, but he wasn't entirely sure yet. He decided to do a test.

He finished off his mug of tea and left his hand in the middle of the table next to it. Ernest copied him, taking a sip of coffee. He set down his mug next to Sephiroth's, and his hand landed next to his, palm up, also in the middle of the table. Sephiroth laid his hand in that palm.

Ernest's ears turned completely pink, and he stuttered a little before regaining his momentum and finishing his story about how he came to spend his nights in the library.

"Maybe we should go. I have a train to catch if I'm going to try and get some sleep before my noon class tomorrow."

"I'll walk you to the train station. I'd like to talk to you some more if possible. If you don't mind."

"No, I don't mind," Sephiroth was amused to notice that Ernest's voice was a half-octave higher and his eyes were wider.

They were quiet during the walk to the train station. The moon shone weakly from behind the thick layer of smog and pollution that hung over the city like a shroud. The train station was deserted. No one from the Upper Plate wanted to go down below at three in the morning.

On the platform Ernest stood in front of Sephiroth and shyly met his eyes. "Are you coming with me, or were you just being polite?"

"I will come if you want me to."

Ernest closed his eyes and breathed deeply through his nose. When he opened them again they were bright and happy, "I would love you to."

Sephiroth kissed him. He felt Ernest wrap his arms around his neck and push back his hood so that he could touch his skin. Sephiroth lifted him off his feet to get closer and licked his lips. Ernest made a sort of gasp but responded, tightening his grip. Sephiroth moved then closer to a bench and stood Ernest on it. This mostly fixed the height difference, but made Ernest a little taller. Sephiroth didn't mind, and he didn't think that Ernest did either.

They almost missed the train.

~000~

End chapter 6

Sorry no Jenova this chapter. It seemed too soon. It should happen in the next one, though.

Sephiroth went on a date! With a man! Don't kill me. Admit it. You're happy he's getting some from someone, even if it isn't Harry.


	7. Chapter 7

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter Seven

~000~

The morning after the storm passed, Harry stepped into a changed world. The snow caked everything so thickly that he wasn't sure how he was going to pass beyond the narrow path dug around the house for firewood. Vincent stepped out beside him and closed the door behind tightly behind him.

"Why are we standing here?" he asked, his voice jolting Harry into action.

"No reason! You've been here before; what do you do when confronted with a problem like this?" He gestured broadly at the ocean of chest-high snow ahead. Vincent looked at him blankly.

"What do you mean? You walk on top of it."

"…Oh."

Harry was not aware of that option. It explained the bizarre basket-like things Constance insisted on strapped to his boots a few moments ago. She spoke so quickly in a mixture of Common and Nibel that he didn't understand a word she'd said.

He clambered up onto the snow and was surprised to find that he could, indeed, walk on it. Vincent floated up a moment later and began walking swiftly toward the pass through the mountains. Harry didn't bother trying to keep up. If Vincent wanted to talk to him, he would slow down. Otherwise it didn't matter if they didn't keep neck-to-neck.

It seemed strange that the reactor would be so deep in the mountains and the town so far from it, but from what he'd gathered from Constance, the place ShinRa wanted them to relocate into had been barren for farming and open to the winds. The current location of Nibelheim sheltered them from the worst of the wind and was rarely flooded completely with snow because of a series of natural run-off points. It made more sense to take a miserable and risky trek through the mountains to adjust the pipes monthly than to move an entire town close by and be miserable and at risk all year round.

The trek to the Reactor took half the day. Harry was disappointed to pass dragon caves and find them empty. Vincent said that dragons were very sensitive to Mako and could very well have died off in the area. Vermin and other originally-small animals were most susceptible to deformation by Mako. Natural predators tended to die off after a certain measure of exposure. Vincent theorized that larger creatures were born with more Mako than smaller creatures.

It was an ugly gray stain in the white purity of the landscape. Large rust stains traced the lines of the building's construction, and Harry wondered why it hadn't been repaired. ShinRa either didn't know or chose to neglect a toxic reactor out of greed. Somehow he thought that it was the second option.

Harry unlocked it with magic. Vincent didn't question how he had done so, which Harry was grateful for. That was the best thing about Vincent. He didn't ask questions. He simply accepted that Harry had strange abilities and left it at that.

Inside the reactor it was dark and smelled of rust, mold, and a sharp vinegary stench Harry identified as Mako. Vincent led the way through the entry hall and down a few passages to a door that opened out into the reactor proper. A high steel structure encircled the tubes that went deep down into the earth to extract Mako. A staircase led up to a walkway for engineers to gauge the tubes.

Harry was just about to ask Vincent what he wanted them to do now when he saw him stiffen beside him out of his peripheral vision. His head swiveled to Harry and fixed him with a vacant stare. Harry stared back in confusion. And then something like malice filled them, and his claw shot out for Harry's throat. Harry leapt back, shouting, "What the hell!"

Vincent didn't answer: he charged. Harry leapt back and then sprinted around Vincent to get to the steps behind him. He dashed up the stairs, fumbling in his pocket for his Materia. He could hear the loud clanking of Vincent's metal boots shaking the stairs as he stomped up behind him. It was the stomping that alerted him to the likely cause of Vincent's sudden violence.

Vincent was possessed! Vincent always moved silently, like a cat, so to see him fumbling around like a zombie could only mean that he wasn't himself. He risked a backward glance when he heard the clanking suddenly stop. He stared at one of the most bizarre sights he'd ever seen. Vincent was jerking spasmodically, mouth working soundlessly. And then a pair of black bat-like wings like leather burst from his back, his features became those of a monster, and he transmogrified into a demon.

Harry didn't stay to watch what happened next. Terror had already gripped him in an icy fist. It was a struggle to make his limbs obey his commands.

He ran the rest of the way up the stairs and then stopped short. At the center of the observation platform was a tank with something, or someone, floating in it. A thicket of wires spread around it like a halo, and he could feel something vibrating in his temples. A deep sense of unease weighted his stomach down into his boots.

Somehow he knew immediately that it was Jenova inside that tube. .

Behind him Vincent let out a roar, and the buzzing intensified. He knew that Jenova would be distracted wrestling with Vincent for control, so now was his chance to destroy her. He approached the test tube and shifted his gaze from the floating alien to the complicated switchboard attached to it. It was almost identical to those they had seen in the basement. The tubes must have all been made by the same manufacturer.

His eyes scanned the buttons as the animalistic noises behind him intensified in volume and fury. Fuck, fuck, fuck. Of course there was no easy 'kill' button and no instruction manual to be seen. He screwed his eyes shut and fought to remember the sequence of movements Vincent used to drain the other test tubes.

He opened his eyes and hesitantly performed a series of maneuvers he hoped were correct. Nothing happened for a long breathless moment until he remembered to pull the lever. The tube began to drain, and he let out a sigh of relief. Once it had drained, he could feel the vibrations grow quieter. Shit. She'd noticed something was wrong.

He pushed the button to open the tube. There was a hissing noise, and then all was silent. He looked over his shoulder and saw the demon watching him. Something churned within him when he saw that he was floating several inches off the ground. He looked back at Jenova.

The vibrating sound in his ears began to steadily grow in volume again until he heard the demon behind him collapse heavily onto the walkway. He peeked again and saw that the figure was switching from Vincent to the Demon, and that both versions had their hands/paws clapped over their ears, faces twisted with agony.

Harry thought frantically about the best way to dispatch Jenova. As he looked at her, he saw that her blue skin had begun to shrivel a little in the dry air. He got an idea. He reached for his Materia and began casting one drying spell after another on her, watching in sickened fascination as her skin began to constrict and then to form cracks. The buzzing grew still louder, so loud that he saw stars and fell woozily against the control panel.

He fought for control and won. He redoubled his efforts. Behind him Vincent let out a scream.

Jenova began oozing liquid, some of which splattered onto his bare hands. He held them up, horrified, and saw the droplets writhing against his skin looking for purchase. He banished them with a thought.

He felt furious now, and his fury made him regain the strength his fear had sapped from him. He ignited Jenova. He watched her burn, feeling her cries grow at first louder and then much softer. A thick noxious gas caused by her burning flesh choked him, and he sagged against the panel, light-headed. When the buzzing finally stopped he weakly banished her with a flick of his wrist.

Vincent, human again, crawled over to him and waited with him for the gas to disperse. When they could think straight again, Harry stood and helped Vincent to his feet.

Jenova was gone. His head ached from the pressure of her unarticulated cries, and he shuddered to think of what she had done to Vincent while he fought to kill her. They stood side by side and looked at the empty container. Knowing what he knew from Hojo's notes, Harry could honestly say that Jenova had been the start of all the evil that'd led to so many lives lost and destroyed.

He banished the container and then the switchboard for good measure. There was an empty space now, and it was as though her very existence had been erased, as though she had never lived.

Vincent walked slowly with Harry, not speaking, as he explored the rest of the Reactor. Harry found and banished the many tubes he found containing humanoid creatures. He wondered how many more places contained evidence of Hojo's cruelty.

Vincent stood by quietly when Harry had finished. Several long minutes passed during which Harry breathed deeply in through his nose and then exhaled through his mouth, trying to slow the thudding of his heart and soothe the pain in his temples. He felt like someone had removed his brain and squeezed it like a sponge.

He wished that it was possible to banish Hojo from the face of the planet right here, right now, but he knew it was impossible.

They found their way back to the entrance and began buttoning up their jackets and pulling on gloves in preparation for stepping out. Vincent opened the door and quickly slammed it shut again. A miniature landslide of snow had slipped in during the brief moment the door had been open, and a fierce blast of freezing breeze had penetrated the Reactor.

Harry's teeth chattered.

"It's storming out there, isn't it?"

Vincent nodded. "We can not leave today."

Harry cursed and stalked back to the Reactor proper. When Vincent didn't follow he turned his head and said, "I don't want to freeze. It's already colder out here. It's warmer in there."

Vincent seemed to accept this and followed. Harry was happy that he did, though he didn't show it. He knew that Vincent would have been perfectly comfortable in the entryway; he was glad he wouldn't have to sit through the storm alone.

They laid out their jackets on the grille of the walkway and sat. neither of them said anything for some time. Harry watched the slow glide of Mako as it moved through the pipes, and Vincent stared down at his hands, or possibly his claw specifically.

"How long do you think the storm will last?"

"The night; the wind will die by noon tomorrow."

Harry cocked his head, "How do you know?"

"I just do."

"Oh."

They were quiet again. Harry moved to the railing so that he could rest his back. He took out the rations he'd packed and offered some to Vincent. Vincent shook his head. Harry shrugged and began to eat his lunch of salted meat and cold potatoes. He was glad Constance had been kind enough to include a few packets of salt. If he closed his eyes and focused really hard he could almost convince himself that he was eating cold chips rather than purple potatoes.

It was almost warm inside the Reactor, and after a while Harry didn't even notice the stench from the Mako.

Twice Vincent stood and patrolled the Reactor to make sure that no monsters had breached it for shelter. When he returned from his second trip, Harry worked up his nerve and finally asked something that had been on his mind since he'd first met Vincent.

"Vincent?"

"Hm?"

"What…what did you do for work before Hojo, you know, altered you? I mean, why were you here in Nibelheim?"

Vincent shuffled his legs so that they were stretched out long in front of him. He crossed his ankles, "I will tell you if you tell me your real name."

"Harry Potter. Now tell me."

"That was not so hard. Why did you call yourself Desmond?"

Harry shrugged, "I kill monsters for a living, and rumors spread. I try to use a few different names so that I don't draw too much attention to myself. It's better if the public thinks that it is three or four different warriors rather than just one."

"I understand. That is very clever."

Harry lifted his chin, "Thank you, but you can stop stalling now. What were you doing in Nibelheim?"

"You wish to hear my story?"

"If you'll tell me, yes. What else are we going to do here while we wait this storm out? And you know there's no love lost between Hojo and I, so I won't report you if you did anything shady."

"It _would _be nice to tell someone," he mused, playing with the digits of his claw, "I've never said the events aloud before. Very well, I will tell you."

Harry unwrapped his dinner of a tin of oiled fish, imported from Wutai, and the roll of dark sour bread Constance made. "I'm all ears. Just let me know if you want any of this."

"Where to start…let me see…Shinra was just coming into power when he decided to collaborate with Dr. Hojo, who was at the time one of the foremost scientists of human evolution and augmentation. He hired him to design a super SOLDIER, and built him the laboratories you saw in the basement of a mansion he inherited from a relative. I was a sort of security guard, called a Turk, and was selected through a series of tests to become a guard for Hojo.

"It was not difficult work. I was required to patrol and wear an intercom that would alert me if Hojo required assistance. There were three other Turks also assigned to the Mansion, and we worked together without much conflict. At first I made no effort to understand Hojo's purpose; the less a man in my position knew, the better. But I couldn't help but notice things. The screaming and the people that began to go missing from the village even though Hojo was kept supplied with willing volunteers and convicts for his experiments.

"I told no one, and I knew that the other Turks had noticed as well. We could do nothing. Turks work with very sensitive information. No one retires from our ranks. We are either transferred to a desk job or…terminated."

"Do you think Turks still exist?"

"Yes. The President is not a man of honor, but he is unwilling to dirty his hands. He prefers to use men like me for that."

"Oh. So…if you were a security guard, and you kept your mouth shut, how did you end up in a coffin?"

Vincent tucked his head down into the collar of his cloak, his way of retiring from a conversation. Harry sighed. "I repeat, what else are we going to talk about? _My _life certainly isn't very interesting. But if you really don't want to talk about it, we won't. I'll just…sit here."

Vincent withdrew his head from his cloak and muttered, "You are very convincing. Have you considered a career in interrogation?"

Harry didn't understand the last word he'd used and asked him to explain it. Vincent explained the joke, and then let out a sigh. "Fine, I will tell you."

"Oh Vincent, you're such a love."

"I do not know what you mean by that, nor do I wish to know."

Harry snickered. He gestured for him to go on.

"You may not believe this, but Hojo, disgusting filth that he is, was married to a very beautiful woman. Her name was Lucretia, and she was also a scientist. There were only ten of us in the Mansion. The Turks and myself, Hojo and Lucretia, and a pair of assistants, so it was very difficult to avoid one another or remain strangers. Hojo was consumed with his purpose, but the others were quite friendly with us, Lucretia in particular. She was a very kind woman. Lucretia was responsible for shopping for food, as she spoke a little of the local dialect, and I was assigned to escort and assist her. I can not explain the way the heart works, but I came to love her. I loved her very much. Though she was married, she was rarely with Hojo and there seemed to be very little intimacy between them. She came to return my feelings, and for a time we were happy. I was young and so was she, but we were careful. We knew it would mean our lives if we were discovered.

"I did not know that she had signed a contract with Hojo dedicating her womb to his experiments. She became pregnant, by me or Hojo I was never sure, and when I heard that the child was already subject to injections I became furious. I lost my temper and argued very loudly with her close to the Mansion. Somehow Hojo overheard us, or perhaps someone told him, but however it happened Hojo discovered our affair.

"He contacted Shinra, as he later told me in one of his raving lectures, and they sold me to him as an experiment. I did not realize then that I was little more than an animal to Shinra, just something that could be bought or sold without my consent or knowledge. One morning I awoke strapped to a metal table.

"As you can imagine Hojo was not pleased with me. He was a very controlling man, something that has made him very successful, but he was also very possessive. To know that a lowly security guard such as myself had touched his wife was horrible to him. He took out his anger on me with experiments in pain tolerance. I was injected with many combinations and types of Mako, sometimes several times a day, and subjected to various ways the body receives pain. It was agony. I begged for death. I thought that my life could never be worse.

"I was wrong. Hojo decided to use me for his advanced experiments in human mutation. I spent most of my day strapped to a table while various body parts were fitted to me without anesthetic and then removed if they were found incompatible. Sometime during this, Lucretia gave birth. Something went wrong with the caesarean operation and I overheard that she was dying, and would pass within several hours if not given drastic medical aid. Hojo refused because the procedure would be paid for with the money granted him for his experiments. He was always selfish.

"I became so angry when I heard this that I somehow found the strength to break my restraints and escape. I am sorry to say it, but I killed my companion Turks in my attempt at freedom. I had no choice, but it is a decision I regret more than others. I threatened the assistants with a gun I took from the Turks and found my way to Lucretia.

"I was so close to saving her. I was helping her into the van that would take us to the helicopter, and finally a hospital, when Hojo appeared. He had a small black box in his hands, and at first I thought nothing of it. My relief at seeing Lucretia again after so long overwhelmed even my physical agony. She was so beautiful and so pale. But the box in Hojo's hands was a device for playing different sounds. He played something very high-pitched that only I could hear with the new ears he had fitted me with. I collapsed, unable to think. He approached and laid his hands on me to take me back to the laboratory. I struggled, weakened, and then to my shock he shot me. He shot me three times in the chest. And that is all I remember."

Harry stared at him with wide eyes. "That is some story."

"Yes. Sometimes I'm not sure it was real, but there are the scars."

"So, wait, if he shot you, how are you alive?"

Vincent fidgeted. It was very graceful, and wouldn't have looked like fidgeting to someone who didn't know him very well, but Harry could tell that he was uncomfortable. Before he could push him, Vincent answered on his own, "During his experiments Hojo found a way to imprison fourteen separate demons inside of me. Their spirits combined with the incredible amount of Mako he injected me with for all of those months caused me to mutate and sent me into a sort of sleep rather than death. That is what I think happened, that is."

"That sounds plausible. Hey, what happened to Lucretia's child?"

"I don't know. I had not even considered that. I imagine that I have already accepted its death. It would be nearly impossible for any creature to survive growing up under Hojo's influence. He is an inherently destructive man and does not know how to create life."

"I believe you."

"But I have had a revenge on him already even though he lives. Those notebooks we destroyed represented his life's work. He will never be able to access that information again. We burned his dreams and efforts. He thought they would be safe in their secret room, but he was wrong."

Harry nodded, "I'm glad you did what you did, and that you let me be a part of it. It needed to be done."

The next day the snow had indeed ceased to fall by noon. They set out for Nibelheim and moved at a brisk pace, reaching Nibelheim as dusk fell. Along the way Harry noticed that they did not encounter a single monster. As they walked through the town towards the Strife residence he asked Vincent why he thought that was.

"The demons inside of me terrify them. Monsters are too afraid to approach me."

Constance was happy to see them back safely, but as soon as she had seen for herself that neither of them was injured she began scolding them for not informing her that they would be spending two days away instead of one. Harry explained the storm. Constance didn't seem to care.

That night as they bedded down, Vincent quietly offered to teach Harry some marksmanship. Harry was surprised, not expecting such a generous gesture from Vincent. They had become closer after their adventure, it was true, but he hadn't realized that it was a mutual feeling until then. He accepted and Vincent said no more that night.

~000~

Sephiroth woke up in a cold sweat.

He had dreamed of wrestling a squid in a ballroom while severed heads shouted obscenities from the walls where they were mounted via pikes through their foreheads. It had been a long time since he had last had a dream so long and vivid and unified. And so strange, too.

His heart went on pounding audibly for a while after he woke up. Finally he got out of bed and took a hot shower. He changed into clean pajamas. The time was something after one in the morning, but he no longer felt sleepy. To calm himself, he took an old bottle of forbidden brandy from the back of the kitchen cabinet, poured a glass, and drank it down.

There would be hell to pay in the labs later, and his stash would be confiscated, but right now Sephiroth didn't care one whit about that.

His hands were still shaking, but beneath the unsettled feeling was something like weightlessness, as though something heavy that'd been strapped to his back his entire life had suddenly been removed by an unseen hand. He briefly considered calling Ernest to talk about it, but the threat of his conversation being tapped and recorded put the idea from his head. He wasn't sure Ernest would understand anyway.

He did not return to bed, but dressed and went to the office six hours early.

~000~

After a month of marksmanship and shy conversations, Vincent bade them farewell. Harry knew that he would miss his quiet friend, but he knew that Vincent needed to return to the wider world. Harry wished he could go with him, but the snow held him back.

In the next few months he hunted more venison than Constance could handle, so much that she made a pretty penny selling it to the town butcher, and spent an inordinate amount of time with Cloud. He helped Cloud with his chores during the morning and performed indoor exercises during the afternoon to keep in shape. Just for fun, he showed Cloud some basic moves with his sword. To his surprise, Cloud proved to be quite graceful and took to it like a natural.

Surprised and pleased, Harry praised him, saying that he could have a real career as a warrior, and was answered with downcast eyes and pink cheeks. Cloud didn't speak to him for the rest of the night, sending him little looks instead. He was careful not to praise too enthusiastically after that. Cloud was very shy and he didn't want to embarrass him.

In the evenings he studied with Cloud. It was something to do and it also helped him become more informed about this world, specifically more modern history, even though much of it had the greasy scent of propaganda to it. He learned that most of those who lived in Nibelheim spoke a mixture of Common and Nibel because the equipment in the Reactor was constructed in Common, and it was easier for the workers to remember what each control meant if they spoke the language frequently.

He told Cloud about his plans to join SOLDIER. Cloud shared his posters of the Generals and news clippings with Harry. They were clearly publicity stunts by ShinRa, but they were also informative. Harry privately wondered if Sephiroth had always been so beautiful, and then wondered why he even cared. Sephiroth was a stranger, and he had only seen him once in person.

When Cloud went to bed he would sit up in the evenings with Constance. He helped her weave simpler projects and read to her from her limited collection of books and magazines while she did more complicated work. They got along fairly well, and Harry was happy that she didn't seem to hold any romantic feelings for him.

Spending time with the Strifes was easy and relaxing, and though he yearned to be out in the world again (and occasionally sexually frustrated) he was happy that he had met them.

~000~

Sephiroth was forced to acknowledge that he was beginning to get tired of Ernest.

It had been a month, and it wasn't as though Ernest was in way lacking in charm or appearance. The physical aspect of their relationship was fine, better than fine. It was just that they don't have enough in common. Sephiroth had not anticipated this problem. From what he'd heard, his men seemed to find a physically-satisfying relationship perfectly satisfactory. But Sephiroth felt like he was trying to assemble a puzzle with only half the pieces he needed.

To make it worse, he could tell that Ernest felt the same way but was too shy to say anything.

He wasn't happy about it, but the next time he found himself in Ernest's apartment he held up his hands to stop Ernest from embracing him and asked him to sit down so that they could have a talk.

He felt both better and worse after ending things. He knew more about himself than he had before, but he had awakened a need inside of him that he didn't know he had. Ernest wasn't right for him, but he now knew that he wanted, needed _someone _in his life.

If only he could find someone who had lived a life in some way similar to his own, someone that appreciated war as an art and his livelihood.

He slept restlessly.

~000~

The snows had thawed enough to travel again, and the time had come for Harry to leave.

The night before Harry was lying in bed mending a sock when he heard Cloud knock on his door. He could always tell when it was Cloud because he knocked four times, one-two, one-two, softly.

Harry opened the door. There stood Cloud looking more upset than Harry had thought possible. He wore no slippers and one sock. There were tears all over his face.

"You can't go!" he whispered, then repeated, "You can't! I won't let you."

Harry sighed and drew him inside. He held Cloud out at arm's length and then embraced him with a sigh. "I'll miss you too, Cloud. I promised to write you letters, remember?"

Cloud didn't speak, only clenching his little hands into fists against Harry's chest. Harry sighed again and held him until Cloud calmed. And then Cloud kissed his cheek. Harry pulled away and looked at him sharply. Cloud met his eyes for a moment before dropping them to the rug.

Harry didn't know what to say.

"Please don't tell my mother."

Harry promised. What else could he do?

Cloud left, and when Harry laid down again his head was a tangle of confusion and revelation. He hadn't suspected that Cloud had a crush on him, but he supposed it was foolish of him to assume that simply because Cloud was raised high in the mountains meant that he was heterosexual or otherwise average in his appetites.

If Cloud was struggling with his sexuality, it would explain a lot of the hostility from the other boys.

The next morning Harry trudged off into the snow. When he stopped for lunch, he realized with a smile that he had spent half a year in the Nibel Mountains and somehow avoided fighting a dragon, the sole reason he had visited in the first place.

He shrugged it off. He had other things to pursue. Dragons could wait.

~000~

End Chapter Seven

Sorry this took forever! And yeah, it is a little shorter, but an update is an update is an update. Real life can be an attention hog, and sometimes I just don't have the energy to look at the complicated notes I have for this story and figure out how to keep this interesting for you guys. It can be kind of intimidating.

Anyway, review so I can see that people still read this!


	8. Chapter 8

~000~

**Vivified**

~000~

Chapter Eight

~000~

Sephiroth met Marcel during a walk under the Plate. He was working out his frustrations about his latest breeding partner, Vera, by killing monsters. In the back of his mind he knew that he would do the locals a bigger favor if he turned his sword on their street gangs rather than the vermin.

Marcel was wandering aimlessly through one of the absolute worst neighborhoods, looking worried and very confused. Sephiroth watched him from a roof top. Finally he took pity on him, knowing that he was very lost and growing more hysterical with every minute. He leapt from the roof the ground, landing just behind Marcel.

Marcel spun around, wide-eyed, and jerked back when he found Sephiroth standing there. Sephiroth was thinly disguised with a hood over his long hair, but his sword was a dead giveaway.

"May I assist you, civilian?"

Marcel recovered remarkably fast. "Yes, thank you. Could you direct me to Sector 7? I've only just moved below the Plate and I'm afraid the train stations are more confusing than I was expecting."

Sephiroth escorted him to his destination. During their walk Marcel turned out to be surprisingly bold and managed to draw Sephiroth into a conversation about the state of public transportation. Sephiroth learned than Marcel was an engineer on the Upper Plate newly transferred from Rocket Town, but that he couldn't afford to live there.

Marcel was not as attractive as Ernest had been, and he was close to thirty years old, but there was a slow throb in Sephiroth's belly that made him want to prolong their time together. He hadn't found an older man attractive before, but from what he'd gathered from Angeal it wasn't uncommon to like several different types of people. Sephiroth had had several one-offs since ending things with Ernest, and was much better at reading when other people were interested in him.

By the time they arrived at Marcel's apartment he was certain that the attraction was mutual. All that remained between them was whether or not Marcel would have the guts to invite Sephiroth inside. Marcel did, as it turned out, have the guts. He invited Sephiroth upstairs under the pretense of looking at some ideas he had about streamlining the train system. That pretense lasted all of ten minutes before Sephiroth decided to take charge and laid his hands on Marcel. Marcel was very responsive to this sort of gung-ho approach. They had sex, and it was marvelous, the best he'd had so far. Although they had little in common, their affair lasted almost two months before Marcel said that he'd met someone at work that he wanted to try and have a proper relationship with. Sephiroth did his best to be mature about it, and managed in Marcel's presence. But once alone in the privacy of his quarters he broke a glass by throwing it at the wall. He had really liked Marcel, and _wanted_ to have things in common with him.

He felt depressed for a week afterwards.

~000~

It took Harry several weeks to find appropriate lodging in Kalm; incidentally, that was the same amount of time it took him to become accustomed to the sickeningly strong stench of fish.

He couldn't understand why Kalm smelled so bad. Wutai exported far more fish but it never smelled half as bad as Kalm did. He wondered if it had something to do with the trio of Reactors ranged through the city but didn't pursue the issue.

With the vast amount of cash he had accumulated through commissions and selling pelts it wasn't necessary for him to work a day in his life for maybe a decade. However Harry had never been comfortable being idle, his one-year break post-war excepted, so he looked into local jobs until he found one that suited him. He now worked nights as a bartender from seven to three. During the day he fulfilled his purpose for living there by reading the newspaper archives and social commentaries available at the local library. He became quite friendly with the staff there and even invited them over for dinner on his night off. He made an effort to cook as much as possible to keep his hand in. Once he joined the army he didn't know when he would get the chance to do so again.

Once a week he wrote a letter to Cloud a page long, just notes about his life and what he had been thinking about lately. Cloud couldn't afford to write him back more often than once a month, so his letters were usually closer to ten pages. He had sloppy handwriting, but Harry was charmed by his thoughts and the funny things he and his mother got up to.

He made contact with a disreputable man named Christopher who assisted him in falsifying records of residency for a hefty price. Harry pretended to be intimidated by the price so that Christopher wouldn't realize that he had more money than a minor king. Christopher managed to re-write the public records so that Harry was now said to have lived with his "aunt", a deceased woman named Joan Clyde, who had moved frequently all over Kalm to avoid paying rent. Another bill later and Harry was established as an ex-clerk at a small law firm called Logan's, which had conveniently gone out of business.

Harry changed jobs and began going under his real name rather than the moniker of Patrick for the first time in ages.

He stayed in Kalm for twelve weeks, learning the topography of the city and absorbing their accent and mannerisms until he was more local than the locals. It was hard work and he hated changing his voice more than anything, but it was necessary if he really was going to spend the rest of his life in this strange place.

Finally he felt prepared to leave for Midgar.

He considered taking a bus or a plane, but decided against it. Midgar was surrounded by a vast desert that was said to contain many monster breeds prone to rabies. It was a wasteland left untouched even by nomads for fear of the monsters. The newspapers blamed the rabid behavior of the monsters on malnutrition, but the opinion of the general public was that Mako leaks were responsible.

He spent his last night in a bar in one of the shadier areas of the city, savoring the ambiance. Aside from the smell and the large population of homeless, it was a nice little town to live in with lots of local color. People weren't necessarily polite but there was a strong live-and-let-live mentality. He felt completely comfortable to do as he pleased without fear of judgment.

He could imagine growing up here.

A woman with short green hair approached him as he was draining his second beer. He misunderstood her friendly greeting and close proximity as flirting and ruefully informed her of his sexuality to the contrary. To his surprise and confusion, she laughed and said, "All the better. We don't have a gay man on the team yet."

"What team?"

"My team. Would you like to come with me and meet them?"

He frowned. This smacked of the illegal, and he couldn't quite put his finger on why. And of course, being himself, he decided to go with her and meet whoever it was that she called her 'team'. He was intrigued.

She led him through a small door at the back of the bar next to the door of the unisex W.C. It was darker inside than the bar itself and it took his eyes a moment to adjust. When they had, he saw that there was a folding table with H-shaped legs propped up in the middle of the room with an interesting group of people sitting around it. All of them looked a little rough around the edges, but none of them seemed completely criminal, so to speak.

"Hello everyone; this is…oh, I'm sorry dear, I forgot to ask your name?"

"It's Harry. And you are?"

"Jo. Have a seat, Harry. This won't take a moment. We just want to talk to you for a little bit."

Harry shrugged and sat, but not before touching his hand subtly to the pocket that contained his Materia so that he could cast invisible diagnostic charms for danger on the entire room, chair included. Most of the people seated were armed with either a handgun or a knife. He decided to sit anyway. He had his sword strapped to his back, after all, and all three of his knives were strapped to his body in their usual places.

"So what did you want to talk to me about? If any of you have met me before, I have to confess I don't remember."

This comment led to general amusement. A man with a jagged scar on his cheek spoke up, saying, "We haven't met, but we've been watching you for the past month. You're a hard man to follow, but definitely worth the trouble."

Harry felt the pieces fit together. He was aware that he had been followed several times but thought nothing of it. He had nothing to hide anymore (a handy obliviation of Christopher saw to that). He had suspected that it was simply the secret police, if ShinRa had them, which they probably did, following him because he was a warrior.

"Well, don't you want to know who we are?" a middle-aged woman asked, seemingly impatient when it became clear that Harry wasn't impressed or upset by anything they'd said.

"Not particularly, but you seem hell-bent on telling me, so do get on with it. I'd like to have another drink before I go to bed tonight, and it's getting late."

Looks were exchanged and some murmuring resulted from this statement. Connie sat beside him and took control of the conversation.

"We followed you because we wanted to see what kind of fighter you were. Unfortunately we didn't get to see you in combat, but Richard there," she jerked her head at a very muscular young man dressed in a track suit, "is something of an expert on fighters and he said that you have serious potential. We also noticed that you recycle and avoid using Mako unless absolutely necessary. Ha, we even noticed that you bathe in the sea rather than use Mako to boil your bath water."

Harry shrugged, "So what? I'm not a fan of Mako. A lot of people don't like it. It doesn't mean anything."

"But it does mean something, Harry," Connie's eyes became intense in the dim lighting, "It means something very important, Harry. Lots of people are unhappy about the side effects of Mako but they aren't willing to live without it. You aren't like that. You're tough, and we think that you're the kind of person that would want to do something about the reactors."

Harry sighed and massaged away the frown lines on his forehead. He didn't say anything for some time. He had read about environmental terrorist groups and anti-ShinRa terrorists in the newspapers. He knew that, logically, a city the size of Kalm had to harbor at least one group. He just never expected to be singled out by them as a candidate for recruitment. Perhaps he should have researched ways to avoid drawing attention to himself.

"I apologize, but I am going to have to turn down your kind offer."

"What? Why?" Connie asked. Richard crossed his arms and flexed his muscles; Harry was not impressed.

"I agree that ShinRa needs to be stopped, but I am sorry, terrorism is not the answer. It almost never the answer. If ShinRa is overthrown through drastic action it will throw the world into political chaos until some new dictator rises to power with promises of restoring normality. I respect your passion for your cause, and I wish you the best of luck, but you will have to do this without me."

"But-" someone started to protest, but Connie silenced them. She turned to Harry again.

"I respect your decision; here is my PHS number in case you change your mind. No one will hold grudges one way or the other."

"Thank you," Harry took the paper and tucked it into his pocket next to his Materia. He stood and bowed formally to the room in the Wutain fashion, "It was nice meeting all of you. Good night."

He left. He had another beer at the bar and nodded to Connie and the others as they left the back room one by one. Richard approached and sat with him. Harry was half-expecting him to try and threaten him into changing his mind, but instead Richard started a conversation about the Chocobo race on the T.V.

Richard offered to walk Harry back to his apartment and Harry accepted. He was tired, and the alcohol was hitting him much harder than usual. Richard already knew where his apartment was, and continued to talk about a recent bank robbery as they walked. Harry shared his theory that the rising rates of street crime were because more people were struggling to pay for Mako, and Richard agreed that it seemed the most likely reason.

They reached his building, and Harry asked Richard if he wanted to come up. Richard flushed and avoided his eyes. Harry remembered what Connie had said about there being no gay men in their group, but now Harry wasn't so sure she was right.

Richard certainly wasn't ugly, and it had been a long time since Harry's night with Angeal.

"Richard? You can trust me. But if you don't want to…come up, you don't have to."

Harry waited until he was sure that Richard would say no, and turned to unlock the gate. Richard touched his elbow, "Wait."

Harry turned. Richard hesitated, and then stepped forward and cupped Harry's face. He tilted his head back so that they could look one another in the eye. Harry swallowed. Richard was swarthier than Ayu and Angeal, but there was something very sexy about the stubble on his cheeks and the slight curve to his nose that belied a break.

"Richard?"

He touched their lips together. It was so gentle and so chaste that Harry barely felt it. Richard pulled away and looked carefully into Harry's eyes. Harry felt tense now with his rushing libido and wished that Richard would move faster, but he didn't want to rush him. For all he knew Richard had never kissed a man before.

Richard kissed him again, this time encircling Harry's shoulders with his thick arms and using far more passion. It was as though a flood gate had been opened, and Harry vaguely wondered if they would make it up to his flat in time.

Richard was an old hand at kissing, it would seem, and made up for the first kiss with twenty more than burned like the sun. Harry let out a moan and gave himself up to the feel of Richard's strong hands grabbing desperately at him and, later, the press of arousal against his stomach. It had been far, far too long since he'd been touched like this.

The gate creaking loudly when Richard pressed him against it broke the spell, and Richard tore his mouth from Harry's with a gasp. He leant his forehead against Harry's and caught his breath. Their chests were heaving, and touched with every inhale.

"Would you like to come up now?" Harry asked when he could breathe again, unable to resist a smirk. Richard grinned and nodded.

~000~

The next morning dawned bright and clear. Seagulls screamed and sparrows cheeped outside Harry's window. Sunlight streamed into the room and filled everything with gold. Richard lay heavy as a sack of rocks on top of Harry, snoring quietly, and Harry was sure that there were bruises the size of plates on his hips. In spite of this Harry awoke feeling better than he had in ages.

He lay there for a good hour just thinking about the future and playing with Richard's short-cropped hair.

Finally Richard woke and stirred. He rolled sleepily off of Harry before sitting up. He rubbed his eyes like a child and yawned wide. Harry watched him, propped up on his elbows.

"Breakfast?"

Richard nodded, "In or out?"

Harry shrugged, "Doesn't matter to me."

"In, if you don't care."

Richard lay back down beside him and turned over onto his stomach so that he could wrap his arms around Harry once more. Harry curled his hands around his neck and scratched the back of Richard's head. Richard closed his eyes and hummed.

"Thanks for last night."

"It was fun." Harry stroked his back. His eyes slipped shut when Richard began to lay biting kisses on his neck and shoulder and reached up a hand to smooth over Harry's ribs.

"You look good enough to eat," he whispered, and Harry snorted.

"Is that your way of saying that you would prefer sex to breakfast?"

Richard moved so that he could meet Harry's eyes. He raised his eyebrows, "You mean I can't have both?"

Harry shook his head, "I'm afraid not. I have to get on the road soon."

"The road? Where are you going?"

Harry frowned, "I thought you guys have been following me. I'm leaving town today to go join the army."

Richard sat up and stared at him, "Are you serious? I had no idea!"

Harry copied him and also sat up. He reached for Richard's hands and held them in his as he explained that he intended to infiltrate the company via the army and see what he could do from there. Richard squeezed his hands tightly when he'd finished explaining.

"I wish I knew this last night. Maybe I wouldn't have…"

Harry frowned, "Wouldn't have what? Spent the night with me?"

"Yeah. Maybe that wasn't too smart. I'm not really…I don't really do one-offs. I've had a few boyfriends in the past, but it didn't work out with them. I really liked you, though, and I guess I moved kind of fast."

"Oh Rich, I'm sorry, I didn't know-"

"No, it's okay. It's my fault for assuming things."

"Well, if it's any consolation, I don't really sleep around either. And I only sleep with people I fancy. Last night was really nice," he smiled weakly. Richard leant forward and kissed him. They kissed for several minutes, neither of them making any move to take things further.

"Tell you what. Why don't you grab a shower while I do some last minute packing, and when you're dressed we can go get a bite to eat?"

Richard nodded, "Alright. I won't be long."

"Take your time."

Once the bathroom door closed Harry sighed and put his face in his hands. Perhaps he'd been spoiled by being single for so long; he forgot how these little misunderstandings could arise seemingly out of nowhere. He had already packed away the meager possessions he intended to take with him, but he stripped the bed and cleaned the sheets with a spell. He washed the dishes in the sink and put them away. He got dressed in the matching jacket and trousers in pale gray with a blue shirt beneath that were made of a very lightweight reflective fabric designed for the desert.

Richard exited the bathroom just as he was lacing his boots. Harry gave him a smile and Richard ran his hand through Harry's hair. It was getting long, and his fringe had grown out until he could tuck it behind his ears. He had been putting off getting a haircut.

They set off for a corner diner that served brunch. Richard said that it wasn't particularly good food, but it was hot and plentiful and the coffee was divine. Harry wasn't much of a coffee drinker; he kept that to himself. Richard had suffered enough disappointment already.

"So when is your bus?"

"I haven't got a bus," Harry replied, taking a sip of coffee. It was actually very good. "I'm going on foot. It's not that far, really."

Richard looked at him like he was mad. "What? Harry, that desert might not be huge, but it's full of the nastiest monsters this side of the planet. Why in Gaia's name would you put yourself in that kind of danger?"

Harry shrugged, "I like to live dangerously."

"Tell me about it!"

Harry just laughed and held his hand. Richard looked uncomfortable for a moment, and Harry remembered that he was still technically in the closet. He made to take his hand back but Richard grabbed it and held on. He smiled weakly.

"Hey, it's about time."

"Okay."

Richard insisted on paying and walked with Harry to the outer city limits. There was a road that the buses and other vehicles took to Midgar, and Harry intended to follow it more or less. Richard stopped at the furthest bus station and looked at him for a long minute. Harry smiled, and Richard pulled him close for a good-bye kiss.

"Stay safe."

"I will," Harry replied, touching his cheek. "Bye."

~000~

He fought his way through the Midgar desert.

The stories about the monsters were only slightly exaggerated. He found the desert monsters more rabid and deformed than anywhere else he had fought. If he hadn't possessed above-normal magical capabilities he would have been dead the very first day. After his experience with shock following the events of the ShinRa Mansion, he was sensitive to the indications of shock and paid close attention to his mood. When he felt a familiar chill descending, he cast powerful repellent spells and waited for it to dissipate on its own.

It took him three days to cross the desert, but those three days felt like a lifetime. If there had been any doubt before that exposure to Mako turned mammals to monsters, it was gone now. But as soon as he passed through the gates of Midgar after flashing his new I.D. card it was as though it had never happened. The events of the past three days morphed into one day, and then a blur of emotion and movement, of snapping jaws and the screams of crazed monsters.

Midgar consisted of sectors of Slums that were vaguely pie-shaped arranged around a central Reactor that supplied the city with power. There were varying levels of depravity in each sector. Supported on a concrete web above these was the Plate. Those who could afford to live on top of this plate called it the Upper Plate. Beneath it was technically the Lower Plate, but everyone called them the slums, because it was hard to call them anything else after setting foot inside.

Harry could technically afford to live on the Upper Plate, but he considered such a thing completely out of the question. He originally planned to sign up for the army immediately, but after passing through the slums on the train he knew that he could never allow himself to do so. There was so much garbage and so much disease he couldn't turn his back on these people.

He found a seat in a greasy donut shop in one of the nicer sectors and looked through the advertisements in the newspaper for housing. All of them were for the Upper Plate. Most newspapers he had encountered were vaguely in favor of ShinRa, but the newspapers of Midgar were so filled with propaganda that he actually felt like he knew _less _about what was going on after reading several articles.

He took a walk through the slums and looked for an inn to stay in until he could find more stable lodging. He was disgusted to find that the slums offered only whore houses and very cheap motels that were rented by the hour. From observation alone he ascertained that prostitution was a major occupation in the slums.

The heaps of garbage on every corner and spilling out of alleys filled the slums with a stench that made him sick to his stomach. He hadn't eaten for hours, but the stench made him wonder if he could ever stomach food again. He was just resigning himself to paying for a night's worth of hours at a motel smelling of sperm and cheap perfume when he saw a tiny sign in the window of a weapon's shop. In very sloppy writing was advertised a room to let above the shop.

The man inside the shop eyed him suspiciously at first but relaxed when Harry offered to pay a month's rent in advance. For all he knew he had just given this man enough money to pay off a gambling debt. Not wanting to seem well-off, he asked if the man knew of anyone hiring in the area because the month's rent was all he had.

He was directed to a dive of a diner down the street that needed a dish washer willing to work for food. He left his bag in the room above the shop but placed strong do-not-disturb spells on it and then warded the room sloppily against intruders. He would do a more thorough job later.

Harry applied and was hired on the spot simply because he was clean and had no facial scars or other obvious injuries. The dinner rush was about to start. He had no idea that he was expected to start immediately, but as he was ushered into the galley kitchen he realized that he didn't have a choice. He put on his apron, rolled up his sleeves, and got to work on the stack of dishes remaining from the lunch rush.

He felt dead on his feet from his journey across the desert and wanted nothing more than to sleep, but the diner was open until midnight and he was expected to stay until every last fork was sparkling in its drawer.

As he was putting away his apron he made the mistake of asking his new boss, Duncan, why they didn't have a washing machine. Duncan looked at him strangely and asked, "Do I look like I'm made of money? You're cheaper than a machine. Now listen smart-ass, I want you here at noon sharp tomorrow."

The dialect of Common spoken in Midgar was much harsher than the one spoken in Kalm, which had stressed vowels and drawn words out. The Midgar natives spoke Common rapidly and with harsh inflection.

"You want me to work a 12-hour shift? Do I get a break?"

"Yes and no. Like I said, do I look like I'm made of money? If there are dishes to be washed, you will be here, shit head. The only break you get is when there is nothing to wash. Now get out of here. I want to close up."

Harry bowed on reflex and left. The slums seemed more cheerful now than they had during the day. Bright neon signs illuminated bars and sex shops, and whorehouses had their girls walking up and down the sidewalk accosting pedestrians. Harry kept his head down and didn't think of anything but the bed waiting for him.

~000~

He slept until ten the next morning. He then discovered that the shower didn't work properly. It spat water intermittently, much of which was red with rust and smelled like vinegar. He almost called to his landlord when he decided to cheat and cast a reparo instead. He almost didn't expect it to work, but it did. The rusted squealing pipes straightened and brightened, and the water that poured out was clean and lacked the smell of Mako it had held before. He cleaned the tub too and repaired the tiles supporting it. He hoped his landlord didn't intend to come in here for any reason. Otherwise Harry would have no way of explaining the suddenly-functional bath room.

When he'd finished scrubbing the grime of the desert, monsters, and grease from the diner off of his skin, he stepped out pink and clean. He repaired the sink, the mirror above it, and the toilet.

He dressed the only other outfit he had, a pair of brown trousers and a plain white shirt meant to be slept in. he didn't care if it made him look sloppy. Sloppy was good in the slums. It would draw less attention to him.

His first act upon stepping into the damp streets of Midgar was to cast surreptitious banishing spells at the garbage heaps. He removed them little by little, focusing on the less-travelled alleys rather than the main streets. He disinfected everything until his head ached from the outpouring of magic.

He could be imagining it, but it seemed as though the city didn't smell quite so bad anymore.

Broken windows were repaired and sagging buildings straightened. There were few people walking the streets in the morning, so it was easy for him to avoid witnesses. He wondered if the windows would still be repaired by the next morning.

He worked until he had to report for dish washing. His magic was relieved at the break from spell-casting and punished him for using it so much with a throbbing headache that put him in a foul mood.

At the end of his shift he had more energy than he did the night before. He went monster-hunting. It wasn't hard to pinpoint their favorite places. Abandoned factories and back alleys were rife with the creatures, and he didn't bother to bring his sword. He simply blasted and banished them one after the other or in lumps if they were small enough.

A week went by like this. The garbage piles were mostly removed, and Harry had to smile to himself when he overheard patrons of the diner whispering about it. The running theory was that it was environmentalists, although some believed that there was a new breed of monster that was eating the garbage.

He knew for sure that the smell of the city had been drastically reduced. On a whim halfway through the second week he began conjuring plastic trash cans that he placed at regular intervals. He did this early in the morning when no one was awake yet, and felt very much like Santa Claus.

As a result of the loss of garbage as cover, it was harder for small monsters to find shelter and sustenance. It became easy for him to locate their new nests and destroy them. He felt slightly bad about the mass genocide he wreaked on the mutated rats, but the knowledge that they were carriers of disease softened the horror of it. He had never heard anything squeal like these rats squealed.

He couldn't believe that no one had noticed him doing this.

Some people still threw their trash on the ground, but most citizens seemed to appreciate their suddenly clean city and used the garbage bins. When Harry had the energy he would wake at five and take a long walk through the slums emptying them one by one before returning to bed for several more hours.

During one of these rounds he got the brilliant idea of charming the bins to automatically banish the garbage when it rose beyond three-quarters of the container. He tried it on a few containers as an experiment. Come the next morning each one was perfectly three-fourths full, and he made sure that the bin would empty from the bottom rather than vanish things at the top. This way no one would notice and the bottom layer of garbage wouldn't putrefy and stink.

It had been a month, and he wondered what the environmentalists from Kalm would think about his little reforms. He spent most of his time repairing the buildings now with strengthening and unbreakable charms, and of course washing dishes. He couldn't do anything about the street gangs or the prostitutes. That was a social issue that was beyond his simple charms.

Perhaps it was time to join the army.

But then there was some kind of leak in the Reactor and there was a mass mutation of vermin that happened to be close to the leaked Mako. The slums were now overrun with rabid beasts that tore the unwary to shreds. The civilians demanded SOLDIER intervention, but ShinRa only sent a squad once a week to do some general slashing and burning, much of which did more harm than good.

It took them a month to fix the leak, during which time Harry barely slept a wink. When not washing dishes he spent all of his energies pursuing the monsters. But they bred so quickly and the leak was infecting more and more every day that he felt quite overwhelmed.

People were afraid to leave their homes if they had them, and the homeless were the first to be destroyed by the rampaging monsters.

Harry began to burn out his magic and was forced to take a break. Unfortunately his magic was tied to him, and when he was tired it was tired. He quit his job at Duncan's diner and spent half the day asleep and the other half decimating monsters. He used his sword and magic in tandem now so that he could preserve his dual strengths longer.

But every night he passed out exhausted and dispirited.

He was careful to wear a hood while fighting the monsters in case he was seen, but his identity was discovered somehow because one day he noticed that the various street gangs now avoided him like the plague.

One morning he was eating a plate of eggs in a diner and writing a letter to Cloud when he overheard one gnarled old woman say to another that, in spite of the monsters, crime had decreased to a record low, lower than it had been since the construction of the Plate. Harry wondered if that had anything to do with him but dismissed the thought as vain.

Finally the leak was repaired and the amount of newly-created monsters dropped. Now all he had to do was find a way to kill them faster than they could breed, and it would just be a matter of time.

~000~

He had lived in the slums for three months now. To celebrate he went to a bar and had his first drink since that night he'd left Kalm. It was a bittersweet thought. He hadn't thought much about Richard in the past months. He didn't think it would do anyone any good if he kept that connection alive. Richard was attractive, and he was nice to be around, but Harry didn't want a relationship with someone nice. He wanted something more intense. Safety wasn't something he knew how to live with.

Lost in thought, he tore the label from his beer into tiny shreds, a deep frown etched between his eyebrows. He would be twenty-five soon. He wasn't sure what to think about that. In normal terms that was young, but for him it was possibly a quarter of his life. Had he spent it constructively? Was he taking enough time to smell the roses? Probably not.

Someone sat down on the stool beside him. Harry didn't take much notice, more distracted by the sudden drop in volume inside the bar, until a low voice asked, "What are you drinking that's making you so fucking depressed?"

Harry looked up and found a broad-shouldered man dressed in a suit sitting beside him. It had been so long since he'd seen someone in a suit that he stared. Then he remembered that he'd been asked a question.

"Just the local brew. It's not the beer, the beer is fine; it's just my thoughts that are bothering me. I'm Harry. Nice to meet you" He would have held out his hand, but something about the way the man carried himself convinced him that that would be a bad idea.

"I'm Rude."

Harry frowned, "No, I don't think so. You seem alright to me."

The man raised one eyebrow, which was covered with so many piercings Harry wasn't sure what his natural hair color was. He assumed that it was dark because, even in the uncertain light of the bar, it looked browner than the counter. "Rude is my name."

"Oh! Sorry. Maybe I should stop drinking these," he held up the bottle.

Rude smirked. "Maybe."

Rude wasn't much of a talker, but they were the only two people there alone and neither of them minded a little company. They talked about the monster situation a little, and Rude asked if he could spend the night at Harry's apartment or vice versa so that neither of them would be caught alone in the streets. Harry agreed, not thinking anything of it. He hadn't slept with anyone since Richard, but that was only partly because almost everyone in Midgar was gross. It was also because he was just so tired all the time he didn't know where he'd find the energy to have a shag.

As it turned out there was nothing sexual about Rude's offer. He didn't snore or steal the covers, so Harry didn't mind sharing a bed with him. He loaned him a pair of his shorts and a t-shirt to sleep in, and that was that.

He ran into Rude several more times, always in the same bar. He came to realize that Rude drank there every Thursday night, and sometimes Tuesdays. Harry wasn't much of a drinker on account of it interfering with his spell work, but he liked Rude and made a point of showing up to visit with him if Rude looked like he wanted somebody there. Sometimes he looked like a prickly hedgehog, or a dog that would sooner bite your hand than let you pet it. And on those days Harry stayed away. He understood personal space.

They never talked about work. Harry had the feeling that whatever Rude did was scary, because the bar always got quiet when he entered, and Rude assumed that Harry was another unemployed son of a bitch. Which was true, after a fashion.

Meanwhile he had managed to reduce the monster population. In true propaganda form, the Shinra funded news attributed the monster decrease to fertility problems and increased fighting over decreased resources, a state of affairs that ShinRa had foreseen, which was of course why it never sent very many SOLDIERS. What would be the point if they would just die off on their own? None of this could be substantiated with evidence, a fact that amused Harry to a high degree.

Not that he wasn't upset about the political structure of the planet; the existence of the dictatorship destroyed his morale and made him want to march up to the ShinRa Tower on the Upper Plate and nail his 95 theses onto the front doors.

Some nights, lying in bed, he would argue with himself about joining the terrorists after all. But every time he decided that it would be unethical.

On a Thursday night he found himself waiting at the bar for Rude to arrive, enjoying a plate of cheese sauce on chips, a favorite of Midgar bars. When Rude arrived, he bought a beer and partook of Harry's chips without permission. Harry didn't mind. He had already had dinner and was eating only because the bar man insisted that he buy something.

When he finished his beer Rude invited Harry to his apartment on the Upper Plate to share a bottle of whisky he just received as a congratulatory gift for his promotion to Full Turk. Harry froze when Rude finally named his occupation, immediately reminded on Vincent. So Rude was the kind of man that became a Turk now. It would explain the terror he saw lurking in the eyes of other bar patrons. If Turks really did do the company's dirty work, and the company ruled the world, that made Rude very powerful.

Harry agreed to go with him. He felt no different about Rude as a person now than he had a moment ago. Rude was a quiet man that attended to his work logically and methodically, no matter what it was, and Harry admired him for that.

Rude's apartment was in a building right next to the ShinRa Tower. Harry had never been to the Upper Plate, and was awed at how clean everything was. Even with his cleaning charms, the slums could never measure up to this level of sparkle. And everything was so new! Rude explained as they walked from the train station to his building that ShinRa frequently built buildings as public statements of ShinRa's continued interest in the well-being of its subjects.

The flat was small and simply decorated. It did not look as though Rude spent a lot of time in it. The furniture looked stiff and unused, and the whole tone of the flat reminded Harry of a stage. There was, however, one personal touch. Over the sofa was a poster of a girl in a very small two-piece.

Harry eyed it with a smile. Rude returned from the kitchen with two glasses of whiskey. Rude saw where he was looking and gestured at it vaguely, saying, "One of my idiot friends super-glued that to my wall, and he won't let me put something over it. He claims that looking at it long enough will trick my subconscious into liking women."

Harry choked on the whiskey he'd just sipped. He wanted to trust Rude, but he scanned it for drugs and found it clean. It was very good quality whiskey, though, and he was quite impressed. Rude sat on the sofa and Harry sat beside him. He wasn't wearing his sunglasses. Harry had only seen him without them once before, but that was in the bar and only for a moment. The lamp light was much brighter than the bar, and he was surprised to see that Rude's eyes were not brown like he'd thought but hazel. They were green around the edges and gold at the center.

Rather than compliment Rude on his eyes, he lifted his glass for emphasis and said, "This is good."

Rude nodded. "Yes."

By the time Harry had finished his drink he somehow managed to find himself naked and willingly spread out under Rude on his sofa as they kissed passionately. Harry wasn't quite sure how it'd happened, and he knew Rude was in a similar predicament, but neither of them wanted to stop long enough to ask silly questions.

~000~

End Chapter Eight

In which Harry fools around with men who are Not-Sephiroth. SORRY SORRY SORRY! Please, please, please do not hate me.


	9. Chapter 9

~000~

**Vivified**

~000~

Chapter Nine

~000~

They met at their favorite bar only twice after the tryst on Rude's sofa. Their last night at the bar happened to be Harry's twenty-fifth birthday, though Harry didn't think Rude knew that. He didn't intend to tell him, either. What would be the point? He didn't want a present, and for all he knew birthdays were ignored on this planet. Without a packet of sweets from Ron and a useless book from Hermione, it was as if his birthday wasn't actually happening.

Rude arrived late. Harry didn't comment. He smiled at his friend and touched his hand to his thigh briefly in greeting. Rude wasn't in the closet, per se, but Harry didn't want to damage his reputation by being too lovey-dovey in public. It was so dark no one could see what went on under the counter; they weren't the only patrons to take advantage of that.

He slid a small cardboard box across the counter to Harry. Harry frowned and gave him a curious look. Rude was not one for expressive facial expressions, and said only, "It's for you."

Harry opened it. It was wrapped in newspaper advertising the SOLDIER program. Sephiroth's eyes watched him through the paper as he removed it. He was reluctant to crinkle it on account of disturbing the perfect symmetry of Sephiroth's lovely face and took some time unwrapping it.

Inside was a PHS. It was very similar to a mobile phone, only more expensive. Technology was very much a luxury in this world, and the rising costs of Mako had kept it that way in spite of new innovations. It was a depressing state of affairs.

"Oh Rude, you didn't have to get me this!"

He took it out of its packaging and admired it, turning it over and over in his hands. It was shiny and sleek as a beetle, and almost the same size. It was a very compact device. He knew from advertisements that it was the latest and most expensive model. He hadn't asked Vincent how much his job paid, but it must pay well if Rude could afford to buy him this on a whim.

"I need a way to contact you. I have to go away on a mission tomorrow and I don't know when I'll be back. I'd like to hear your voice while I'm away."

Harry frowned. "I'm sorry that this present is because of those circumstances. I'll miss you. You're the only person I can talk to in this town."

Rude looked rueful and held his hand under the counter. They decided by mutual assent to leave the depressing bar and find dinner somewhere. It was still early enough that the streets weren't crowded with the night life just yet. The monsters were still roaming but there is only so much the threat of a violent death can do to dampen some people's desire to party.

Soon the two of them were sitting comfortably in a small restaurant Harry sometimes frequented because it made the best curry in the city. Conversation was sparse; Rude spent much of the night looking down at his plate rather than Harry, and Harry didn't want to force him to talk. His wandering in the wildernesses of this planet had made him accustomed to silence. He wasn't sure he would be able to have a long conversation if pressed. Perhaps he had lost the ability.

By mutual assent they spent the night on the Upper Plate in Rude's bed. Harry felt more pliant than usual and told Rude to do anything he liked. This turned out to be a very slow session of love-making so drawn out Harry sobbed when he finally reached release. Not that it had been unpleasant; he didn't know that Rude was so romantic, and quite enjoyed the kisses laid all over him and the long cuddle afterward. He never would have though by looking at Rude that he needed this kind of physical affection, but it was stupid to judge a book by its cover.

Around seven o'clock in the morning Harry got out of bed and switched on the lamp. He walked barefoot to the window and drew back the curtains and looked out. The heavy pollution from the Reactor interfered with the amount of sunlight that could break through the cloud of smog hovering over the city. Sometimes it didn't get light until nine.

He watched the light break through. The darkness was diluting into a pale gray morning light, and Harry could see the cloudy roof of the sky very low above his head and flying with the wind.

Rude woke and went to the shower. Harry considered joining him but decided against it. They'd slept later than was advisable and he didn't want to be underfoot while Rude groomed.

He sat on the bed and watched Rude pack a series of impressive firearms into his 'go' bag. He wore only a towel tightly tucked around his waist and no sunglasses. Harry never tired of the glimpses he caught of his unusual hazel eyes. He knew why Rude wore the sunglasses. There was something very vulnerable about his eyes that made him look ten years younger than he was. That was not an asset in his line of work.

Rude held him for a long minute in the hall outside his apartment. And then they parted ways, Harry bound for the train and Rude for the ShinRa hanger. Neither had said a word to the other all morning. There was nothing to say.

~000~

Sephiroth was unhappy.

He had now impregnated seven women and was no closer to understanding why. He had a vague theory he'd pieced together from Hojo's mumblings about using the infant's DNA as building blocks. He thought that they might be used for understanding what made a super solider "super".

No matter the reason, he wasn't happy about it. Perhaps it was the result of his own stolen years spent in the laboratories; the very idea of children, his or otherwise, being used as nothing more than chemical resources upset him deeply. But there was nothing he could do at the moment. He wanted desperately to find some way of rescuing them before any harm could befall them, but he had no idea how to go about that. The pregnant women were being kept in the laboratories under very tight security. The whole situation made him feel helpless and confused.

He tried not to think about it too much.

And then there was the matter of Genesis and his latest fiasco. Genesis had a new fiasco every year.

Sephiroth could barely believe it when Angeal whispered it into his ear in the hall shortly after Genesis' return from a mission in Costa Del Sol. Genesis took his protégé and lover Clovis with him to train him for the upcoming SOLDIER Second exams against the advice of Lazard, the SOLDIER Program Director. Clovis had taken and passed the SOLDIER Third exams with little trouble, and Genesis was confident that some extra work would prepare him to pass the next set of exams.

Genesis was very proud of him and rarely went anywhere without him. This had been a source of friction between Angeal and Genesis, because Angeal did not approve of what he called "taking advantage of a protégé sexually". Genesis insisted that Clovis was an adult (barely) and could make his own decisions.

But in spite of his talent and potential, Clovis was killed in a monster skirmish last weekend. It wasn't included in the official mission report, but the helicopter pilot, Turk Wilcox, said that Genesis had pitched a huge tantrum/fit and decimated a dragon at great risk to his well-being along with a large section of rain forest.

That did not bode well. Although a fabulous Commander and gifted warrior, Genesis crippled himself with his mood swings and occasional bouts of childishness. Sephiroth cared for him, but Genesis did not always make that an easy thing to do.

With the death of Clovis, Genesis was left alone in shame. No one said it, but everyone knew that Clovis' death would never have happened if Genesis hadn't insisted on bringing him along on missions far beyond the youth's skill.

Sephiroth had only seen Genesis once since his return, but certain listlessness to the way he moved alerted him to Genesis' depression. When not worrying about his children, he worried about Genesis. It was a well-kept secret, much like Sephiroth's affair with the Wutain Emperor's daughter Sayuri that Genesis had tried to commit suicide several times during his adolescence.

He knew that Angeal was just as concerned, but Angeal had problems of his own. He had begun seeing a woman named Penelope from the Turks. Penelope was a single mother, and her pubescent son didn't care for Angeal no matter how hard he tried. Angeal put on a brave face, but Sephiroth had known him too long to be fooled. Angeal liked children and was upset by Connor's coldness.

After a week of this he got fed up and went to the roof to clear his head. It was only four in the afternoon and too early to go home, but the roof was usually deserted these days and offered a fantastic view. Once upon a time the President was always moving to and from a helicopter, but no longer. His latest stroke had temporarily removed his speech and he was being kept carefully out of sight for the time being.

To his surprise, Genesis was already up there. He stood very tall and erect, facing the view of the desert towards Kalm, wind blowing in his hair. When he turned at the sound of the door closing, Sephiroth saw that his eyes were shining like two stars. He was magnificent.

Sephiroth had always thought Genesis beautiful, but in the same way he considered his Masamune beautiful. The beauty of it did not affect him.

Maybe it was the loneliness awakened by Marcel's absence, or maybe it was the knowledge of how vulnerable and sad his friend was, but Sephiroth felt something powerful stir inside of him. Genesis turned back to the desert without greeting him. It was clear that he wanted to be alone.

Under normal circumstances Sephiroth would have honored his wishes. But a terrifying vision of Genesis flinging himself off the side of the ShinRa Tower made him approach. He stood beside him in silence. He knew that Genesis was crying and wished he wouldn't. He never knew what to do when Genesis cried; that was Angeal's specialty.

Genesis leaned his head on his shoulder. Sephiroth held still, barely breathing.

"I'm glad you're here."

Sephiroth relaxed and put his arms around him. "Do you want to come over after work? We can drink some non-alcoholic beer, and if you want I'll even let you read me some of Loveless."

Genesis laughed. The tears were gone now as if they'd never been. Sephiroth forgot how quickly Genesis' moods changed.

"How sweet of you. You're being awfully nice to me, Sephiroth. What did I do to deserve this?"

Sephiroth smiled. "It's been too long since we've spoken outside of this building, and even longer since we've had a mission together. I missed you."

And he had. He just didn't realize it until then.

Genesis walked with him to the elevators at seven. He talked animatedly about a new book that was coming out the next month by one of his favorite authors. Sephiroth really wasn't that interested in thrillers. He listened anyway.

The books he rented from the library were usually classical novels about noble-minded people fighting against circumstances beyond their control. He had tried reading more modern novels but found the weak-willed characters hard to sympathize with. Perhaps it was his military training, but reading about undisciplined foolish people doing stupid things in the pursuit of inexplicable goals was not his favorite activity.

The only modern novel he'd read and enjoyed was by a Wutain man, and although nothing was said outright in the book, it was clearly a metaphor for the War. Sephiroth would never say so out loud for fear of it being recorded, but he hated what ShinRa had done to Wutai. The small nation had resisted Mako. So what? It was only one energy source of many, and much of the population there was too poor to afford it in the first place. But unfortunately their mountains contained many rich deposits of Mako, and the President couldn't resist the temptation to mine them.

Non-alcoholic beer was sold at a kiosk in the lobby. Sephiroth bought two packs. As he was checking out Genesis added a trio of apples from the tiny produce section. Sephiroth didn't comment. Apples meant that Genesis was feeling homesick.

Sephiroth hoped he wouldn't burst into tears as soon as he started drinking.

Genesis whistled upon entering his apartment, "I forgot how Spartan this place was. Honestly, Sephiroth, one of these days you're going to have to let me at least put some artwork up. This could be a prison if you removed the sofa."

Sephiroth, with his back to Genesis, rolled his eyes. They had this conversation every single time Genesis visited. It'd been years and he had never actually made a concrete effort to 'beautify' his living area. Why should he? It _was _a prison, in a manner of speaking.

Genesis talked about absolutely nothing as they ate. Sephiroth didn't interrupt or force the conversation into more serious subjects. This was just Genesis' way of letting off stress. When he talked about how irritating he found it when the Turks used their private copier machine, he was actually using his anger at them as a medium for expressing his self-disgust for the bad decision's he'd made.

Sephiroth was expecting to sit on the couch but Genesis asked to see his room.

He had slept with a few men now, but none of them had seen his bedroom. None of them had seen his apartment, to be frank. Sephiroth didn't want to draw attention to himself or to his partners, so meeting in his private residence was out of the question. Sephiroth also wasn't too keen on the idea of letting someone he hadn't known for years and years into his private space.

Genesis took the liberty of spreading out on his bed. Sephiroth placed the beer on his nightstand and lay beside him. They stayed up drinking half the night. Genesis finally talked about Clovis around two in the morning, and cried again. Sephiroth impulsively put his arms around him, and Genesis clung to his neck so tightly Sephiroth could feel his head begin to fill with blood.

And then Genesis was kissing his face between declarations of how good a friend he was. Half-asleep now and definitely mentally impaired, Sephiroth found himself kissing back. Genesis hooked one sleek leg around his hip and pulled him close, and Sephiroth was lost.

Neither of them could look the other in the eye the next morning. It was clear that their encounter had been a mistake, but neither knew how to talk about it. Genesis made an excuse about observing new recruits for a protégé and left without eating breakfast.

Sephiroth leaned forward at his table until his forehead was resting on the cool metal surface. He should have just left Genesis alone.

~000~

Rude showed Harry how to use the PHS before he left, but he didn't call him for two weeks. During this time Harry started running out of monsters to kill in the slums, and got a job at a convenience store just to give himself something to _do_ with his spare time. He couldn't stand having nothing to do. It made him feel restless, as though he was carrying something heavy that he couldn't put down.

In one moment of genius he decided to start hunting in the desert outside Midgar on the weekends. To his surprise, he realized that a number of the beasts were edible. He hadn't known as much about monsters during his initial passage through the desert, and simply killed without consideration of the benefits the monsters could have.

ShinRa refused to acknowledge it, but the simple fact was that not enough food was imported into the slums to feed the population living there, and Midgar was obviously unfit for growing anything more complex than fungus. Harry lit upon the bright idea of selling the edible monsters he killed. It would be tricky to get them into the city, but if he could convince butchers to come out and possibly cart the meat away themselves, that problem would be solved.

Three butchers laughed in face. They didn't believe it was possible for someone to just charge into the desert and kill monsters unless they were enhanced with Mako. Harry wondered if that idea had been started by ShinRa to keep them dependent on the protection of SOLDIERS.

A butcher named Waldo Goodenough agreed to come out one Saturday and at least have a look. Harry thanked him and promised that it wouldn't be a waste of his time.

And it wasn't. He formed a sort of contract with Waldo that resulted in Harry changing his hours at the supermarket to part-time. The time he spent mopping floors and putting price tags on tinned goods was necessary to give his magic time to recharge and allow him to rest muscles that became very sore if they were tense for too long. It was one thing to work out in a safe environment like a gym; it was another kind of stress entirely to risk your life while moving non-stop fighting monsters for hours at a time.

Rude called roughly every two weeks, usually to let Harry know when he would be back in Midgar. They no longer met in bars. Sometimes they went out to eat, but only if Rude was hungry after his mission or if Harry had missed a meal to come and meet him on the Upper Plate.

Harry enjoyed his company and Rude felt the same but they didn't consider themselves a couple. They were just two friends that happened to have sex when Rude had a free evening. Sometimes Rude called just for the hell of it. He couldn't talk about his missions, obviously, but he would talk about the places he got to visit and strange food he'd tried. He knew Harry was fascinated by other cultures and all things food, and kept their chats interesting and informative.

Finally the day came when all of the monsters plaguing the slums were dead. Harry waited two more weeks to fulfill his contract with Waldo, killing monsters in the desert for food. But the fact was that it was time to join the army.

He called Rude and asked him if he was free for lunch. To his surprise he was, and they met at the same diner Harry had washed dishes at. The food wasn't half-bad, if you mopped up some of the grease beforehand with a napkin.

Harry told him a semi-truthful account of what he'd been up to in Midgar (sans magic) and told him about his plans to join the army. Rude didn't show much sign of it, but Harry knew that he'd shocked him when he told him that he'd been killing monsters willy-nilly as a hobby and for extra revenue on the side. Harry supposed it was a big step from "I work at the market".

Rude asked Harry about joining the Turks instead of SOLDIER. Harry demurred and said that he preferred to fight monsters rather than people. He added that he was never very good at surveillance-style work.

"Have you been listening to rumors about Turks?" Rude joked. Ultimately he respected Harry's decision, even though both of them were glum about having to meet only on weekends when Harry wasn't training and Rude wasn't on a mission. Neither of them said it out loud, but both knew that this was the natural end of their affair.

Rude insisted on accompanying Harry to the office when he signed up. Harry didn't question him. Who knew when they would have the chance to just be together again?

There days later Rude had a free afternoon. He escorted Harry to the recruitment office in the slums (for appearances sake) and kept him company while he waited for his physical examination. Rude wore plain clothes, but the other hopefuls also waiting were frightened of him regardless.

Harry wondered if he was impervious intimidation by strong men.

The physical examination was invasive and performed by a cold-faced woman in her fifties wearing fatigues. She ordered him to strip and once she had finished examining his physique and ascertained his medical history, she shoved a cup into his hands and directed him to the W.C. He didn't want to know why they needed a urine sample, but he hoped it was just for something obvious like a drug test.

He returned to the waiting room while they assessed it. Rude was flipping through a magazine, looking very out of place. Harry smiled and boldly laid his head on his shoulder for a moment after he'd seated himself. Rude rested his arm on the back of Harry's chair in a surprising display of affection.

The same woman from before, who never introduced herself, came into the waiting room twenty minutes later and pronounced his physical condition as perfect. He was then sent to be fitted in a uniform. This done he was handed a sheaf of information about the program and ordered to be at the barracks on Monday morning with every item on the list of supplies included in his information packet.

Harry was pleased to see that his fake I.D. had held up under scrutiny.

Rude and Harry surprised each other by kissing passionately in the train station, neither caring who saw them. Rude bought a motel room rather than wait for the train to take them to the Upper Plate. Once inside it they made near-vicious love.

It would seem that both knew that this could be the last time, and they wanted to make the most of it.

In the aftermath Rude traced the contours of Harry's back muscles and said, "You are the most beautiful person I ever had the pleasure of knowing."

Harry was surprised and found himself blushing. He wasn't used to compliments like that. "I really value you as a friend and a lover, Rude. Knowing you has been really…something."

~000~

End Chapter Nine

This chapter was supposed to be much longer and include Harry's first day at Shinra and Zack, but I am really tired and wanted to post before I got into a not-updating rut again. Enjoy!


	10. Chapter 10

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter Ten

~000~

His first day at Shinra was uneventful.

He got settled into his barracks and met the other nineteen trainees in his set. They were nice enough. It was just that…well; he wasn't expecting them to be so _young_. He didn't remember the military men in Britain being so uniformly under the age of 20. But then he remembered that the life expectancy of a civilian on this planet was only about 45 years. Between undesirable living conditions, monsters, and crime, it was a miracle if you could make it to 50 without any serious injuries.

They were to be shipped out to boot camp the next morning. Their extra day in the military barracks was purely to give foreign recruits some leeway in case their transportation was delayed.

Harry was the only one who didn't go out drinking and carousing the night before they shipped out. He used his evening alone in the temporary barracks to text Rude. When Rude went on a surveillance assignment Harry got bored. He wasn't allowed to bring any reading material with him and there was no TV in the barracks. He decided to see if he was allowed to explore the building. It was just a boring network of halls and barracks. He was startled to see that the eyes of the men he passed in the halls had a faint greenish light to them.

He found himself worrying again about how his body would react to Mako. And then that made him think about the laboratories in Nibelheim, and about Vincent. He wished Vincent had a PHS so that he could call him and see if he was alright. He hoped the noxious gas from Jenova's burning ceremony hadn't led to any negative after-effects for Vincent. That poor man had enough problems as it was.

To take his mind off of that thought, he left the barracks. He thought about going below the Plate for a drink, but he didn't want his first day at boot camp to be any worse than it already would be. Instead he walked around the Upper Plate, watching the interesting patterns the clouds of pollution made. It reminded him of the Aurora Borealis.

And then he somehow wandered into the 'urban' district, and there was the ShinRa Tower. That was where the SOLDIERS lived, where Sephiroth lived. He swallowed and decided to try the lobby doors. It was only nine o'clock. Maybe they were still open to the public.

They were. He couldn't believe it. The President lived in this building! And the doors were open to civilians? It turned out that it was only the lobby that was open. In order to use the elevators to advance to any of the other floors you had to confirm an appointment and your identity with one of the twenty receptionists ranged around the perimeter of the lobby. He wasn't too disappointed. The lobby was spectacular. After the grime of the slums, it was surreal to see something so polished. It reminded him of the grand buildings in London.

The bank of elevators, some with glass doors and others with steel (he supposed the steel ones to be freight), formed the central pillar of the lobby. There were four entrances to the building, one in the center of each wall. White and gold brocade sofas were arranged tastefully throughout.

He shyly approached the nearest receptionist. She smiled at him.

"Hey…um, listen, I just joined the army and I have nothing to do all night. Do you mind if I sit here for a while and read some magazines?"

She hesitated, "Oh, I don't know…"

His eyes flicked to her name tag. Shannon. "I won't be any trouble, Shannon. I promise. And if you get sick of looking at me you can ask me to leave and I'll go."

She was looking a little flushed now. She shrugged, "Okay, I guess you can stay. Do you want something to drink? They're for guests, but I don't think anyone else is going to be coming through tonight."

"Some water would be nice."

With another exchange of smiles he left to pick a sofa. There was an impressive array of magazines to choose from, no doubt in an attempt to cater to the diverse crowd of visitors. He picked out one on architecture and sipped his water.

He spent several hours reading. Periodically he would get up and make conversation with Shannon. She was single mother and lived below the Plate, but she was saving up to attend Midgar University. She wanted to be a historian. She tried to coax him into talking about why he joined the army, but there wasn't much to say on the subject. How could he expand upon, "I'm good at killing monsters and want to take down your government from the inside"? Not that he included the latter half of that statement in his explanation.

It was close to one in the morning before he felt tired enough to get up and head back to the barracks. But first he was going to finish reading an article about Rufus Shinra, the Vice-President and heir to the company.

If he hadn't stayed to finish the article, he would have missed what happened next. The doors to his left opened and a figure came striding in. Harry looked up and saw someone that he was not prepared to see for months yet. It was Sephiroth.

The General crossed the lobby in smooth strides, silver hair swinging. He was taller and even more beautiful than Harry remembered. He also looked tired. The 'up' button was punched into the bank of elevators and the doors slid open.

He met Harry's eyes by accident as he stepped into the elevator. Green met green and stayed connected until the doors closed and Sephiroth was taken up and out of his sight. Harry realized that he hadn't breathed the entire time Sephiroth was in the room.

He decided right then and there that, everything else be damned, someday he had to know him.

With a final farewell to Shannon he departed and walked rapidly back to the barracks. Some of the other men were back, smelling like cheap beer and cheaper women. Harry thought about the contrast between the prostitutes below the Plate and women like Shannon who was trying so hard to get away from that lifestyle. He wished he still had the fortune he had at home. He would gladly invest it in some kind of fund for helping women get out of the Slums and into decent jobs.

~000~

Harry awoke at five o'clock to the sound of a siren going off. It rudely interrupted a vague but very pleasant dream he was having about Sephiroth. He leapt out of bed, mistaking the sound for a fire drill, and dashed barefoot and pant-clad to the door. He had stayed in a Muggle hotel one time after the War that burned down and had no desire to get caught inside a burning building.

The door was jerked open from the other side and Harry collided with the sergeant that saw fit to enter at that moment.

"Oh!"

"Ooph!"

Harry backed away, saw immediately what had happened, and apologized profusely. The sergeant waved him off, "I don't even want to know what just happened. Everyone up! Breakfast is in the mess at the end of the hall. You have half an hour to eat, pack, shit, and whatever else it is you need to do before you are reassembled here for departure. Is that clear?"

Harry found the shouting unnecessary. He saluted with everyone else who had managed to get out of their bunks so far. The sergeant grunted and left. The door slammed painfully loud behind him. Someone groaned.

Harry felt sorry for the other trainees. Why did they think a drinking binge the night before was a good idea? He supposed it was done out of desperation. Who knew when they would have the time, money, and energy to do so again?

He pulled on his fatigues and made sure that everything that needed to be in his bag was in it. He fingered the Materia in his pocket and wondered where to put it. Would they be inspected? Would their bags be inspected?

In the end he decided to carry it with him and hope for the best. If all else failed he could obliviate someone as long as he was quick enough. He placed do-not-disturb charms on his bag and headed for the 'mess'. Thanks to his walk last night he knew where it was. It was still mostly empty. He took the pre-served tray handed to him and found a seat in the corner. It wasn't that he wanted to be anti-social; it was just that he was the only one not hung over and he didn't want to start any kind of resentment this early in the game.

He chewed and let himself drift off into thought. He wondered if things would end up working out between him and Rude after all. Yes, he would away a lot, but Rude already was and they'd found ways to make that work. Maybe they would manage to find time to see one another every few months and have a meal, have a night. He massaged his forehead and sighed. He didn't even know if he _wanted _things to work out between him and Rude. Rude was lovely, absolutely refused to participate in dramatics, and he was very intelligent. He was easy to talk to and easy to be around. Why couldn't Harry just join the Turks and take a chance at happiness?

He sometimes wondered if there was a quirk in his genetics that made him deliberately sabotage himself every time he had a chance at something good. What else could possibly explain his utter rejection of a steady job on Earth or a peaceful existence in the monastery back in Wutai in favor of the relentless pursuit of adventure? He could have been happy with Ayu if he'd just stopped being so ambitious. And what was the point of ambition? It nearly got him killed more times than he could count, and for what? He had nothing to show for himself. He had a tidy sum of money from selling skins and meat, a piece of Materia, and a multitude of small scars littering his body that refused to disappear.

"What's the matter with you?"

Harry looked up. He wasn't expecting someone to seek him out. He found a dangerously thin redhead standing there. How did he pass the physical examination, he wondered? In this light he took a quick glance at the other trainees and raised his eyebrows. Dressed uniformly in fatigues, he could see that many of them were quite thin, if not sickly. He supposed the foot shortage affected everyone.

"Mind if I sit?"

Harry moved his tray aside, "No, please, sit."

The redhead sat and forked a mouthful of greenish scrambled eggs into his mouth. Through his chewing he said, "I'm Reno. So, I know for a fact you didn't party last night, so what the hell is the matter with you?"

Harry shrugged, looking away so that he wouldn't have to watch Reno chew with his mouth partially open. It wasn't that it was gross; it just reminded him so much of Ron at Hogwarts, before Hermione slapped some manners into him. he didn't think about home very much, but Reno brought a wave of homesickness to crush his spirits further.

"I don't know. I'm just…thinking. This is really happening. We're going to go off and train to become soldiers, and maybe we'll die in battle, or maybe we'll languish here doing jack squat until we're released for being too old…it's just depressing…"

"Yeah, but," Reno pointed at his tray to illustrate, "You get free food. You get clothes that fit and _shoes_. You get to sleep inside when you're not in a camp or on a mission, and you get two weekends off a month. The pay isn't great, but it's not bad either. I tell you, man, this is much better than finding some dead end job in the slums."

Harry felt even more depressed after this little speech. He managed to scrape together a decent life under the Plate, but most weren't so fortunate. He thought about the barefoot children and the homeless that were killed by the monsters because no one would shelter them.

He took a drink of coffee. Reno poked him with his fork.

"What's your name?"

"Huh?" Harry snapped back to attention. Maybe he should have gone to bed earlier the night before. He wasn't used to being sleep deprived anymore, not since the monster fiasco died down.

"You zone out a lot. What's your name?"

"Oh, Harry. Sorry. I'm just really tired."

"I feel you, man. I tell you, I have slept on garbage heaps that were more comfortable than those cots. But I did some snooping and the other barracks have better bunks. They just give the new guys the worst of everything to toughen us up."

"Oh." Harry was impressed. He hadn't thought to compare. "So, Reno, you joined the army for room and board?"

"Basically. I don't really want to be in the army, though. I hate being told what to do."

Harry frowned, "Then why did you join?"

Reno smiled slyly as though he knew something Harry didn't, "Well. Have you ever heard of the _Turks?"_

Harry felt something stab him painfully in the chest as he was reminded of Rude and Vincent in turn. He nodded.

"If you're good enough, they recruit you out of the army. It's got better pay, you're allowed to work independently or with a partner, and I heard that they let chicks do it."

Harry hadn't even noticed the lack of women. ShinRa didn't allow women in their army? Why not? Without thinking, he voiced his question. Reno looked around before leaning in and whispering,

"The official reason is that it would be too expensive to build separate barracks and monitor for sexual harassment, but we both know that's a lot of bullshit. You've seen how many new buildings are up here. The President builds something new every time he takes a piss."

Harry took another sip of coffee, "What's the real reason?"

"Mako makes women infertile."

Harry choked on his coffee.

"And that would lead to this whole bad chain reaction. Women with good fighting genes wouldn't have kids. Only sissies wouldn't be in the army, and then who the fuck would ShinRa recruit? That and girls would get really angry if maybe they didn't want kids when they joined the army, but then they changed their minds, only to find out that Mako already fucked them up too much to carry a kid."

Harry felt like he was getting some kind of information overload. "How do you know all this?"

Reno sat back and returned his voice to its normal pitch. He finished his eggs. "I get around. I hear stuff." He stuffed an entire piece of gray toast into his mouth. Harry had to smile at the familiar sight.

"Hey, you look nice when you smile."

Harry blinked, "Thanks…?"

Reno nodded to himself, "Yeah, when you don't you just look sad, or worried or something. But when you smile you look really…you know, nice. You should smile more."

"Thanks Reno. I'll think about it," Harry smirked. He couldn't help but realize that Reno was partially right. He had lived alone for so long that smiling no longer came naturally. Was he turning himself into a sour old man before he even reached 30?

They finished eating and walked back to the barracks together to wait for their sergeant. Both were already packed, so Reno opted to bring his bag over to Harry's bunk and sit with him. they chatted about the types of exercises they would be doing, and Harry asked if Reno had any combat experience.

"Nah. I killed a monster once, and I've been in street fights like any other kid from the slums, but not, you know, _combat _experience."

Harry snorted. "You make it sound so fancy. I was just asking."

Reno smiled widely at him for the first time that morning. Harry noticed that he was missing some teeth in his upper set, midway between his front and back teeth.

"Then let me "just ask" you some questions. Do you have a family or something? You know, kids? You're kind of old."

"Hey! I am not old. I'm 25, not 40."

"You look pretty old to me," Reno teased. Harry, on impulse, pinched him sharply on the arm.

"Ow! Fuck! You pinch hard!" Harry just laughed in face, so Reno repeated his question.

"No, I don't have a family. My parents are dead, and the aunt that raised me passed as well. I've never been married, and if I have kids somewhere, I sure as hell don't know about them."

He thought about Ginny and Ray. She would have given birth by now. How old was his child? God, he didn't even know if it was a boy or a girl. How pathetic was that?

Reno snapped his fingers under his nose. Harry jerked.

"Dude, like I said. You zone out too much."

Before Harry could protest or apologize, their sergeant returned and did roll call. One trainee was missing, but he turned out to be in the restroom. When he was located, flushed with embarrassment, they marched in a sloppy two-file to the hangar where a plane was located that would take them to the ShinRa boot camp crash course in Gongaga. It was located in the jungle for ultimate discomfort. It was less an exercise in training than a way of weeding out the week.

While on the plane Reno regaled him with rumors of men dying left and right in the jungle from heat stroke and dehydration as they were forced to run miles through the jungle with monsters at their heels. Harry didn't believe a word of it. Knowing ShinRa, the camp would be a carefully-crafted torture device designed to wear you down physically and psychologically.

He almost hoped Reno's version was correct.

The plane landed in a very high-tech and extremely out of place airport in the middle of the jungle. Harry could already feel the heat seeping through the metal walls of the plane before he disembarked.

The heat hit him like a solid wall. They were ordered without ceremony to pair up for tent sharing. Because they were an odd number one recruit got to transfer to another batch of recruits that had arrived last month for the time being. That person turned out to be Harry. Before he could even claim Reno as his tent partner, the sergeant pointed a finger between his eyes and ordered him to get his bag and come with him.

He gave Reno a rueful look and followed the sergeant through the concrete-paved camp to the other group of trainees. He wondered why he had been selected and not someone else. Had it been a random choice?

The sergeant was kind enough to explain to him, as soon as they were out of earshot of the other recruits, "Look, you're probably curious about why you're being transferred. The thing is, your file was marked as Perfect. And that means you are already considered an asset. You are physically and mentally prepared to be a soldier, unlike those skinny boys back there. This means that you get to skip the introductory mindfuck bullshit designed to weed out the weak and get right down to training."

"Oh."

Well. That explained it.

They arrived at the edge of the jungle. The sergeant pushed aside a leaf the size of a man that had overgrown the path and plowed forward. Shortly they arrived in a clearing. There were ten tents arranged in two neat rows.

"The boys are already on the training field. You can put your stuff in that tent there," he indicated the tent at the far end, "and wait here. An escort is coming to get you so you can join the rest of your new friends in the mud."

"Sir!" Harry saluted. He must have done so well. The sergeant looked impressed and then saluted back.

"It's a pleasure to have you with us, Potter. Don't let me down."

"I won't, sir."

The sergeant left. Harry let out a huge breath and actually clutched at his hair. He wished he'd thought to shave his head before he came out here.

The tent contained one cot. He hesitated and then began setting up his across from it. The tent was barely big enough for them to fit with a foot of space between them. He wished they had bedrolls instead, for the sake of space, but knew that the raised cots were most likely meant to deter snakes.

A large insect buzzed into the tent and made straight for his neck. Harry clapped his hands and killed it. That reminded him to set some serious anti-insect and anti-vermin wards around the tent. He had been fortunate- they checked the bags but not the men, and no one had discovered his Materia.

"Cadet Potter?"

Harry emerged from the tent and saluted. The aide saluted back and then, without further explanation, turned and led the way down a different path through the jungle. Thanks to his warding the insects avoided Harry, but latched onto the aide with a vengeance. Harry almost felt guilty, but that disappeared as soon as he saw the huge welts the bug bites caused.

They emerged into a different clearing. Nineteen young men were doing pushups in neat formations. Was everything in this camp so neat? And if so, how did they achieve that? With rulers? With charts?

He forced himself to pay attention. He was directed to join them and did so. They had just started, because they were only on number ten. He wasn't used to such a bland form of exercise. He was accustomed to ducking and dodging slashing beasts. But this was alright. It was almost soothing, and the burn he began to feel in his core, arms, and toes after they passed the 200 mark was…dare he say pleasant?

The pushups were followed by a generic stretching session, and then water bottles were distributed in preparation for a run through the jungle. Each man was given two, one to consume immediately and one for during and after the run.

Harry was already soaked with sweat simply from the heat. He forced himself to sip the first water bottle and enjoy the brief break they had. He sat on the grass with the others, slowly flexing his ankles. After some time of simply enjoying his water and the heady scent of the jungle, which was bursting with life, he realized that everyone else was privately looking at him. Some were better at hiding it than others.

He supposed they had a right to be curious. These men had survived the weeding out process, and probably weren't pleased to discover that, had they gained some weight and gotten some outside experience prior to joining; they might have skipped a month of hell. Or maybe they just didn't like the look of him. Maybe they didn't even care and just wondered at the novelty of him.

A signal was given for them to stand and prepare for their run. Harry strapped his water bottle to his left thigh. It was the leg he favored less, so the weight distribution might actually help him correct himself. Empty water bottles were tossed into a receptacle, and then they were off.

The running caused him more pain than the exercises did. It wasn't that he didn't have the endurance. It was that the terrain was difficult and it was nearing noon. Harry became convinced that he would be cooler if you set him on fire.

Their run ended at noon, and they walked for twenty minutes back to their tents. A cook had arrived at some point and was serving up a kind of stew with a base of beans and nameless meat. To Harry's delight, large slices of a vegetable very much like an avocado were floating on the tops of each bowl. He loved trying new foods. The flavor of the soup itself was surprisingly like that of a tomato, but spicy.

He sat crosslegged on the grass with the others and ate. There was mostly silence for some time. Harry sized up the other men and tried to get a feel for the dynamic of the group. He would be in basic training with them for three months at least and should at least make an effort to understand them.

Most of them were subtly carved off into little groups. He wondered which of these boy-men was his tent mate. With a smirk, he asked himself which of them he _wanted _it to be. Most of them were nothing to look at. Strong, yes, but otherwise unremarkable. Many had acne or acne scars, and some had disfiguring facial scars from fights. He pegged them as from the Slums or another urban area.

Three weren't so bad. One was a blonde, a little slight but cute. He seemed childlike, though, and was listlessly tearing up pieces of grass and shredding them. Another was a brunette with classic good looks. Unfortunately, Harry could tell that he was fully aware of his appearance. The last had an incredible head of black hair that spiked up all over the place like a hedge hog. Harry would have laughed, but he had such a good natured look to him that he couldn't make fun. He let his eyes linger for a few moments longer. Where was he from, he wondered? Unlike their pink-tinged companions, his skin had browned nicely.

Harry realized that he was looking back at him. He looked away and pretended to be generally staring off into space.

There was a rustle of grass, and the youth settled beside him.

"Hi! Sorry I didn't say anything before, but I think we're room mates now."

Harry raised his eyebrows. "Oh, did you have your own tent?"

"I did. But it's okay; I have a lot of siblings, and I'm actually not used to having things all to myself."

"That's very nice of you to say. I'm Harry. It's nice to meet you."

"Oh! I'm Zack. Zack Fair. So why are you here instead of with your other group?"

They got on extremely well. Harry couldn't believe his luck. How did he end up rooming with someone so nice and eager to please?

In the upcoming weeks, as Harry's body adjusted to the heat and his blood thinned, he was able to do better in training. He found himself walking a fine line. He wanted to do his best, but the rest of his group outside of Zack and the oldest member, a bald bouncer-like man named Ned, refused to acknowledge him as it was. He also didn't want to draw undue attention to himself. He learned that Ned had also been transferred in as an 'asset' because of his physical assessment. Was it more personal because Harry was just young enough to not be seen as a father figure, like Ned was?

The months flew by, and before he knew he was on a plane back to Midgar. He was surprised that basic training went on for so long. He had thought that it only lasted weeks in most countries back on earth.

They were combined with what remained of the other groups that finished. Harry was surprised to see Reno, and contrived to sit beside him. They had been unable to speak to each other more than a handful of times in the training center.

Reno informed him that only five of their original group had made it through, not including Harry. The rest either went home or took ShinRa's offer to become low-level employees at one of their various companies.

That statement really drove home that ShinRa essentially owned everything on the entire planet. It was such a bizarre concept for him to understand. The only things ShinRa didn't own were some farms, and then places like small groceries, weapons shops, seedy inns, and bars. Heaven forbid he ever take it into his head to start a small business.

He is careful in boot camp not to do too well. Five men survive the process. The rest either go home or take Shinra's offer to become low-level employees at their various branches. Harry realizes that Shinra basically owns everything except some small groceries, weapons shops, seedy inns, and bars.

That night they were assigned bunks at random due to a computer glitch. Harry found himself in a bunk beneath Reno's. He was happy to see his friend again, but he wished he could have been in the same room with Zack. He was so used to hearing Zack's snores at night that he would have trouble sleeping without them.

He lay in his bunk listening to the sounds of the other men sleeping. They had the day off tomorrow, and then they would be officially assigned to platoons. From now on their time would be spent between training and classes in tactics and the like. Harry wondered if Rude be free tomorrow. He was lonely and sexually frustrated, and wanted so badly to see Rude again, even if they ended up not doing anything remotely sexual.

He heard a creaking sound, and then a shuffle. He frowned. A leg appeared over the edge of the bunk above him, followed by its twin and then the rest of Reno. He climbed easily into Harry's bunk. Harry made room for him.

"What are you doing?" He whispered.

"Nothing," Reno responded, tucking himself under his covers. He flung a still-thin arm over Harry's chest. "I just knew you were awake, and I was awake, so it didn't make sense to lie in the dark ignoring each other."

"Oh."

Harry turned his head and nestled it against Reno's. "How old are you?"

"Seventeen."

Harry remembered being seventeen. He smiled in the dark. Reno let out a snuffle and gave him a squeeze.

"Harry?"

"Hm?"

"Are you…would you want to…do anything with me?"

"What do you mean?"

Reno's arm began to slide ever so slowly down his chest, and his breath warmed Harry's ear. A surge of loneliness so strong his eyes watered followed this move.

"You know. Stuff."

Harry swallowed and then carefully stopped Reno's arm by grabbing his wrist. "I'm sorry, Reno," he whispered, "I just can't. You're so young. I'm sorry. Please don't be offended. It's not personal."

Reno tensed and then relaxed with a sigh. He put his head on Harry's chest, "It's okay. I'll get over it. Can I still sleep here?"

"Yeah."

~000~

End Chapter Ten

Ten already? Wow.

There will be more Zack. I promise that wasn't the end of it. You know I love that sugar pie.


	11. Chapter 11

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter Eleven

~000~

That moment when their eyes met, Sephiroth knew exactly who he was looking at. His hair was longer and his skin darker, but those eyes were the same. But how could that waiter from Icicle Inn have made his way halfway around the world and into the ShinRa lobby? It just didn't seem possible. And he had seen him for only a moment. He could very well have been seeing what he wanted to see.

By the time his elevator reached his floor, he had convinced himself that he'd hallucinated the entire encounter. He hadn't slept in two days and could be excused a minor illusion.

He locked his door behind him and stripped on his way to the shower. He reeked of Mako and monsters. There had been an incident outside the city; a pack of monsters attacked a bus of tourists from Junon, killing 14 and leaving 8 more wounded. SOLDIER was called out, and as soon as it became apparent that it was too big of a story to cover up, Sephiroth was dispatched to deal with the matter for ultimate publicity.

In the shower he allowed himself to imagine what he would have done if it really was Harry. Would he greet him, invite him out…or perhaps bring him straight back to his apartment? His heart thrilled. He didn't bother to wash his hair beyond a slap-dash cleansing of the worst of the blood. He was more concerned with getting the worst of the damage off so that he could sleep comfortably. He would deal with his mess the next morning.

Had he not been so tired, he would have indulged his body's sleepy arousal. As it was he fell asleep wrapped up naked in his sheets. He dreamed all night of chasing someone through the evergreens of the Nibel Mountains. He could never get close to make out his face; all he felt was an overpowering urge to overtake him.

~000~

There was a delay in his breeding sessions after he impregnated Janice. As it would turn out, the disgusting living conditions and poor diet currently enjoyed by most of the population was not a good way to create people with perfect genetics. Hojo was running out of women that didn't have serious flaws that were still young enough to produce children.

A month went by, and Sephiroth began to feel relieved. Perhaps this was the end of it.

His hopes were shattered by a text from Hojo ordering him to meet his latest womb at the Hotel Greenwich. Sephiroth couldn't believe that Hojo had the nerve to refer to a young woman as a 'womb', regardless of her purpose.

He arrived with some time to spare and settled himself down on the bed for a nap. He had trained with Angeal that afternoon, not expecting to be subjected to anything strenuous that evening. He only intended to rest his eyes, but he dropped off into sleep.

He awoke to a soft touch against his cheek. He had rolled onto his stomach sometime during his nap. He pushed his hair out of his eyes. A small hand assisted, tucking his hair behind his ears and out of his way. A remarkable little person stood in front of him.

She had blonde hair to her waist that flowed like water from the crown of her head in waves that reminded him of water. She was flat-chested like a child, and wore a sort of smock the color of sunshine. She had that odd untidy elegance to her, like a rumpled pigeon. With her round face and soft, wide mouth, she looked like a girl barely old enough to be called a woman. She was smiling at him. There was something impish about it.

"Did you have a nice sleep?"

He sat up, rubbing his eyes, and nodded. "Yes, thank you. I apologize for not being awake when you arrived."

"Don't apologize!" she perched herself on the edge of the bed, "I'm Simone."

"Hello Simone," he smiled politely. She smiled back, and its brilliance made something that was disconnected inside his psyche fuse back together. He felt warmth swoop down his chest and pool in his heart. He…liked her. At first glance. He just did. There was no logic to it.

Simone put her hand into the long, white, cold hand of the General.

"I didn't know how I'd feel about this, but I don't think it will be so bad. I like you, Sephiroth," her eyes, blue, he noticed, sparkled with good humor as she said this. He had never seen someone who looked so alive. He didn't realize how dead everything else looked until he had her as a point of comparison. Where had Hojo dug her up?

He squeezed her hand, "I like you too, Simone."

She released his hand and crawled into his lap. He expected to find her smallness uncomfortable as he had Ophelia's, but something about those bird-bright eyes and the sheer sunniness of her washed away any sensation that he was holding a child. He couldn't tell her age, and wasn't sure he'd believe it if she told him.

She put her arms around his neck and huddled close as though cold. He put his arms around her and held her. And then something else opened inside of him, and as soon as he felt her lips touch his neck, he began to feel the beginnings of arousal.

He hadn't taken the blue pills. They weren't necessary this time.

When they'd finished, they lay side by side in the big hotel bed and just breathed in the atmosphere of a job well done. She put her hand to her chest, her thumb and fingers forming a 'V' that cradled her neck. He turned his head and watched her chest rise and fall as she breathed in and out, in and out.

He smiled at the sight and reached over to smooth a hand across the soft flesh of her collar, her breasts, and her navel. She giggled and turned her head to meet his eyes.

"I'm sure this whole process has been a real trial for you, General. Imagine, being forced to have sex with attractive women."

He snorted, "Honestly? You're the first one I actually…"

She seemed to understand without the need for him to articulate the remainder of his sentence. Her eyes widened. "Oh! Hey, wait, I'll bet you say that to all the girls."

He laughed and rolled on top of her, enclosing her pretty little head between his forearms. "You like to talk back, don't you?"

"I think it will be an invaluable asset in our upcoming offspring," she recited as though from a manual, and then grinned. With a surge of her neck she kissed his nose. "You smell good."

"I smell like sex and you."

She touched his face, "Exactly."

"Are you hungry?" he asked after some minutes of letting her touch his face and aching to either get away from her or have sex again. He decided not to pressure her. Instead of answering in any useful way, she trailed a hand down his side and made it very clear that a second bout would not be in any way an imposition. He let out a sigh and dipped his head to kiss her breast. She was so warm and so soft, but so firm at the same time.

He loved the feel of her moving against him and the energy that seemed to pour off of her like a generator. He knew that, should he have seen her during his initial people-watching walk, he would have decided to pursue her rather than Ernest. Perhaps he had done the female sex a disservice by assuming too quickly that he wasn't interested in them.

She fell asleep after their second encounter, and he let her sleep.

A car went by, the road was quiet again, and light rain fell against the window glass. Sephiroth sat with elbows on knees and hands clasped for a good many minutes.

He didn't know what to do. if he had impregnated her, he would never see her again. Did he want that to happen? What if he sabotaged the pregnancy somehow so that they could spend more time together? He hoped she wouldn't be adverse to that. These girls weren't paid to pretend to like him, after all, and some of them outright disliked him and couldn't wait for their sessions to be over as much as him.

Could he live with himself if Hojo punished her in some way for failing to fulfill her contract?

~000~

He found Genesis waiting for him in his office the next morning.

With his back to him, Genesis asked, "Tell me, Sephiroth, are you afraid of death?"

"I guess it depends on how you die," said Sephiroth after a moment's thought.

Genesis turned, raised his eyes and looked at Sephiroth as if his curiosity had been aroused. He had apparently been expecting another answer. "You're right," he said, "It does depend on how you die."

Sephiroth decided to get straight to the point. He found that that helped when dealing with his partners.

"Genesis, I wanted to apologize for what happened between us. We were both very tired and were not thinking clearly, but I could have said no and I chose not to. I am very sorry if I hurt you or made you uncomfortable. You are my friend, and I want to keep it that way."

Genesis moved to play with his hair. It was a nervous gesture he had never quite managed to stamp out. "It's okay. Like you said, it was an accident."

Sephiroth smiled at him. It came easily after seeing Simone. Something about her made him feel light inside, despite the many problems facing them if he did decide to find some way of pursuing her.

"So why all the talk of death?"

"Huh? Oh. No reason. I was just thinking about Loveless, and I realized that I didn't know how you felt about it."

Sephiroth nodded as though this made perfect sense. He made a mental note to inform Angeal that Genesis was having an 'off' day. They seemed to be happening with more frequency lately, and Sephiroth had to wonder if Hojo had changed their injections or decided to put something special in Genesis' food just to see what would happen.

~000~

Scarlet stepped into the elevator and punched the button for the lobby. It began to descend with agonizing slowness, and she let out a groan of frustration. She forgot that it was the first of the month. ShinRa employees were advised to use the freight elevators on the first so that the glass elevators could be examined and repaired if necessary. It was a normal safety measure, and she was grateful to it, but that didn't make it any less irritating if you forgot and stepped into a normal elevator. Who knew when she would make it to the library?

She glanced over at the occupant. Her eyebrows went up. It was Reeve, the Head of Urban Development. He was normally a marshmallow of a man, filled with wonderful ideas but utterly lacking in the backbone necessary to making them a reality. He was really a nice person, so she was surprised to see evidence that he was in a foul mood.

With nothing else to do, she turned to him and asked what the matter was.

Reeve seemed to expand with fury and the unleashed it in the tightly-worded sentence, "The President elected to refuse implementation of a plan that would solve the Mako crisis."

She winced in sympathy, "You too, huh?" Reeve seemed surprised, so she went on, "I come up with something maybe once or twice a month, and every time I get shot down. I don't get it. I'm a weapons designer. I need to work with materials that I am positive will still be available next year, and you know what? I'm not so sure that our Mako supplies will last that long. The Reactors need to be replaced immediately, but nobody wants to pay for that kind of monster project. But if nobody pays for it, then the leaks will just keep getting worse, and a large percentage of what little Mako we _do _mine is wasted on making animals into monsters."

Reeve looked relieved, "Oh, scarlet, I can't tell you what a relief it is to hear you say that. I thought it was just my Department. I thought the rejected proposals were a sign that my Department was on the verge of liquidation. Gaia knows we're invisible as it is. No matter how many grants are available, we never seem to get any money."

"Sorry, Reeve. That's awful," a sly look came into her eyes when she remembered what Rufus sometimes did for her when he liked one of her proposals, "You know, Reeve, the President isn't the only man around here with power."

Reeve gave her an appraising once-over and lifted his eyebrows. She smiled and said no more. But when the elevator finally reached the lobby, Reeve cordially invited her out to lunch whenever she was free next week to discuss mutual ideas for Mako-independent ideas. She accepted.

~000~

"Sorry I'm late!" Sephiroth apologized the moment he unlocked the door. It was his third night with Simone and the only available elevators in the ShinRa Tower were so crowded that he had to take the stairs. He hated the first of the month.

"It's alright," Simone called from the bathroom. "I took the liberty of a bath. We've still got three hours. Why don't you come in and join me?"

He raised his eyebrows but bent to remove his shoes. He took off the restrictive suit jacket and starchy shirt he was forced to wear. The President had sent him in his place to a meeting with an envoy from Costa del Sol and insisted that he wear a suit instead of his uniform or anything more casual. Sephiroth wore his uniform in meetings when he was meant to intimidate, and a suit when he was supposed to be the charming face of the company. Sephiroth personally thought that using your General as an ambassador was a fairly strong statement that war would be the result of insubordination, but said nothing. He wasn't paid to have opinions.

He stepped into the bathroom and began removing his trousers. Simone looked up from the sandwich she was eating and smiled. There was a streak of mayonnaise on her lip. He bent and gently removed it with the pad of his thumb.

"How are you?"

He shrugged, "Tired, a little irritated."

"You know, I'm really surprised that you do so much, well, office work. You seem to spend all of your time behind a desk, never having any fun or breathing any fresh air. I thought you would spend more time running around doing heroic things."

"ShinRa runs out of heroic things for me to do sometimes, and there are some things that only I can do when it comes to my men."

"Isn't there a SOLDIER Director?"

"There is, but it's his job to organize missions and liaison with the Science Department. He is also responsible for our P.R. My job is a little more hands-on. I review all applicants to the program. No one joins SOLDIER without my consent."

"Wow. I guess I didn't think you were so involved," her mouth was full. She offered him the second half of the sandwich and he accepted. Naked now, he settled in the tub with her. It was a tight fit, and she ended up moving around so that she could sit between his legs. It was cozy.

"I like my job. There are parts of it that I don't like, of course. In general I enjoy it."

He rested his chin on top of her head and slowly chewed the sandwich. It was the first thing he'd eaten since noon. Thanks to the elevator situation, food deliveries were delayed. He didn't have time to stay and wait for his dinner to make it up to his office, and he wasn't cruel enough to send Ginger, his secretary, off to fetch it for him.

Simone told him about her job in the P.R. department, and about how she was kept out of sight because she didn't look like the other women in the office. He had to laugh at the idea of a team of P.R. agents approaching you, and one of them looking even more like a little girl next to the Amazonian goddesses that department normally hired.

"Do you like your job?"

"No. I wanted to be a journalist, and I worked for two years at the Midgar Daily Journal, but it was just so…I don't even want to talk about it. I would have used my imagination _less _if I decided to write children's books instead."

"I see."

They didn't talk much after that. They made ample use of what time they had remaining and then ate dinner in the hotel restaurant on Hojo's dime. Sephiroth found himself reluctant to leave Simone. She was slightly more subdued this night due to a problem at work, but she was still much better company than his empty apartment.

He had never invited a date over to his apartment. It was a sort of unarticulated rule he had. It kept things from getting too serious, too personal. But he wanted to be personal with Simone. He wanted to bring her into his home and make her feel comfortable there.

He bit his lip, and then invited her over. She was openly surprised but accepted his invitation.

~000~

Scarlet/Reeve/Lazard scene. (notes)

~000~

Sephiroth was in the middle of organizing a random inspection of the SOLDIER Second barracks when his PHS beeped. He glanced at it and then froze. He scrolled through the text again, slowly this time.

_Simone Feathers has been successfully impregnated. _

_Prof. Hojo_

He closed his eyes and reopened them. The text was still there. Blinking rapidly, he tucked the phone into his breast pocket. He felt so distracted that it took him five minutes to decide which lieutenant to appoint as inspector, and then he changed his mind five minutes later when he remembered that that lieutenant was romantically involved with one of the SOLDIER Seconds.

He hadn't felt this distraught since he heard of Ophelia's suicide. He buzzed Ginger and told her to hold his calls for the next half hour. He stood and paced his office before settling by his window. He stared out at the bleak view of Midgar. Below him, they looked like toy houses. Cars the size of his little finger sped without fear or hesitation through the streets, safe, protected.

He sighed and rested his forehead against the glass. It felt cold. He felt cold inside.

~000~

There were no more suitable women available. Sephiroth felt simultaneously relieved and heavy-hearted when Hojo informed him of this in passing. He was receiving his weekly physical. The scientist bustled around him with surprising energy. Sephiroth hadn't seen him so vigorous in years.

"We have a special round of injections in the works for you next week," Hojo confided, finally revealing the source of his excitement. His beady black eyes shone with anticipation. Sephiroth could only assume that the injections were both expensive and painful.

The door opened and an aide stepped inside. The aide was white as a sheet and quivering perceptibly with fear.

"What is it?" Hojo snapped, looking up from his tray of Mako injections. The aide swallowed, looked at Sephiroth, and approached Hojo to whisper in his ear.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Hojo shouted. Sephiroth, startled, jumped.

The aide, a young man who could only be just 20 years old, burst into tears. Gesticulating wildly, he waved around a stack of paper. Hojo seized it from him and began scanning it. Sephiroth was fascinated. Normally he was kept very much in the dark regarding the inner workings of the laboratories.

Hojo flung the paper at the far wall with a roar of fury. The thick clip containing them snapped at impact and the paper fairly exploded all over the room. The aide began to hastily pick them up. Sephiroth, taking pity on him, knelt to help him. Hojo began ranting and raving,

"How could this happen? I'll have them skinned, pickled, sent to the desert! Whoever took her won't live long enough to regret robbing me, robbing the President! My notes, my life's work!"

He went on in this vein for some time, adding a variety of curses that Sephiroth didn't know he knew the meaning of. Sephiroth gathered the rest of the paper and, over the aide's protest, began shuffling them into proper numerical order. As he did this he skimmed them, speed reading their contents. An unknown substance coded as 'Jenova', stored in the secure facility at Nibel Reactor 04, along with a number of other experiments also stored there had gone missing. All sustaining equipment was removed, and the entire Reactor looked swept clean of everything but the pipes.

Another mission report was attached after the one detailing the Reactor, and it reported that the Shinra Mansion and accompanying laboratories located in Nibelheim had been burnt thoroughly to the ground. All that remained were some small vestiges of the concrete blocks that had formed the foundation. All experiments, notes, and furniture were utterly destroyed.

Sephiroth didn't know that the President owned a mansion in Nibelheim. It seemed strange that the man would have anything to do with the wilderness at all. The man panicked if a lowly insect penetrated his office.

When it became clear that Hojo was not in a state of mind to complete his injections, Sephiroth took his leave. He could hear Hojo's furious shouting echoing throughout the entire floor.

He left the reports with the aide and rescheduled for later in the week with the Department secretary. Like everyone else in the Department she was white-faced and trembling.

He wondered what the significance of the reports had been. Hojo worked with thousands of experimental substances. Why did this one, Jenova, matter more than the others?

~000~

Harry was taking advantage of his first weekend off to walk the halls of ShinRa. He was assigned to a platoon with Zack and only three men that he knew from basic training. He was sorry to part ways with Reno, but they still saw one another in the mess at mealtimes, so it wasn't so bad. Privately, Harry thought it was better if he kept some distance between them. Reno was an interesting person, just not someone Harry would want to consider dating.

Zack was new to Midgar. He was native to Gongaga, which explained his darker complexion and imperviousness to the heat of the jungle. He adapted fast to the cooler climate of Midgar, though he was prone to whinging in the evenings when it became quite cold.

He took to the busy urban lifestyle like a fish to water. He confessed to Harry that he had felt smothered in his small village. He loved his family and missed his brothers and sisters, but he was happy to be making something of himself. Harry found him easy to talk to despite their age difference. Zack had the same passionate desire to see as much of the world as possible, and to leave his mark on it. Zack was more idealistic than Harry, but that was a side effect of his youth. He hadn't lived long enough to know what real heroes could be like.

They had only been stationed in Midgar for two weeks, but Harry had already been approached twice by SOLDIERS for personal training. He turned them down, insisting that he preferred to be kept with his platoon to help foster a sense of teamwork.

Zack thought he was crazy, and insisted that Harry spend his free evenings training him so that he could develop the same reflexes and muscle memory Harry had. Harry didn't mind training him. Frankly, he was happy for any excuse to be out of the barracks. It wasn't that anyone had made an outright attack on his character. It was just that he could sense a negative atmosphere towards him from the others. He did his best to minimize it, but there are only so many of your body's natural tendencies that you can suppress.

Harry wished he wasn't so obvious. He didn't join the army to get noticed. He joined the army to understand the way ShinRa worked and eventually to get access to the Tower.

He passed out of the barracks and into the administrative center. There was a guidance counselor, a secretary, and a small office containing computers and copiers for general use of the soldiers.

He walked down the long corridor, not thinking about anything in particular, when, without warning, he was dragged into an unknown room.

He elbowed his assailant. His feet were kicked out from under him and he was pinned to the ground by someone taller, wider, and heavier than him. He was about to maneuver himself into a groin-kicking position when a familiar voice laughed,

"Relax! It's just me."

Harry frowned in the gloom. The office was lit faintly by the glow of a screensaver. In its light he could make out a smooth head and a broad set of shoulders he could recognize anywhere. A smile spread across his lips.

"…Rude?"

"Yeah, it's me. I didn't mean to startle you. I just wanted to kidnap you for the weekend."

Harry laughed and relaxed beneath him. "I don't mind so much."

Rude released his forearms, and Harry touched his cheek. They smiled at one another in the dark. Rude dipped his head and kissed him. It was as though someone had electrified him. Harry didn't realize how starved he felt for affection. They spoke on the phone once or twice a week, but that wasn't the same as being face-to-face.

"Do you want to go somewhere with me?"

Harry slipped his hand between two buttons on Rude's shirt and smoothed his fingers across his firm chest, "I don't know. What's wrong with here?"

Rude smirked. "This room is under surveillance."

"…Oh."

~000~

He returned late the next day and found Zack waiting for him on his bunk. He sat and began to unlace his boots.

"What's going on, Zack?"

Zack looked uncharacteristically glum. "You know I've been seeing this girl, right?"

Harry raised his eyebrows. They had been here less than a month and Zack had a girlfriend? "I knew you met a girl. Etta, right? I didn't know you were seeing her."

Zack shrugged, "I don't why I did it. I guess I just wanted to do something familiar. I always had a girlfriend back home. Maybe I was homesick. Anyway, we've barely been seeing each other for a week but she calls me all the time. She always wants to fight about something, and it's always something stupid. But there are a couple times when she doesn't want to fight, and then she's so sweet I forget all about the nasty part."

Harry chewed his lip. "What do you want me to say?"

Zack turned the biggest, saddest blue eyes on him that Harry had ever seen. It was no wonder he always had a girlfriend. "You're older than me, and you're really smart. Can't you give me some advice? I don't know what to do."

"Honestly? Get rid of her. I know that sounds mean, but the city is full of girls, and you shouldn't feel like you have to date this one if you don't get along. You're under a lot of stress as it is. Why don't you try dating someone who makes you feel good? Someone that's a friend as well as a girlfriend."

"Someone like you?" Zack teased, grinning now. Harry laughed and punched him in the shoulder. Harry's sexuality had been a surprise for Zack. Coming from a small village, he had never met a gay man before. He was under the impression that gay men were effeminate; needless to say, Harry's uber-masculinity soon dissuaded him of that thought.

"Right; just with a different set of reproductive organs."

Zack smiled and squeezed his arm, "Thanks. I don't know if I've said this, but I'm really glad I met you," Harry raised his eyebrows in question, and Zack went on, "You're like a big brother. It's nice having you around because I can use you as a goal, too. When I'm as strong as you, I'll be satisfied."

Harry laughed, "I'm not _that _strong!"

"You don't look it, but you totally are."

Harry stopped protesting and let Zack fill him in on the latest gossip. How Zack found out about these things were completely beyond him, but in some way Zack knew the first name of every single executive secretary. Thanks to Zack, Harry was now familiar with the Departments that made up ShinRa. It was going to be more complicated than he hoped to take the company down.

A week later Zack fairly pounced on him during dinner and announced that he had met someone while exploring the slums. Harry proceeded to zone out as he went into super fine detail about a girl his own age that sold flowers, and had the most amazing long brown hair, and beautiful eyes, and on and on and on. Harry felt a bit bad for not really listening, but Zack could chatter for hours about absolutely nothing.

It wasn't that he wasn't intelligent. It was only that talking helped him process his thoughts.

His new girlfriend was named Aerith, and according to Zack she liked that he talked so much. She said that he had 'great spirit energy', whatever that was.

~000~

Harry didn't know it, but that Sunday night Commander Genesis Rhapsodos disappeared unarmed into the Midgar desert.

~000~

End Chapter 12

Aww this was an emotional rollercoaster. And oh look, finally Sephiroth discovered women! For real this time. Never fear, it couldn't last, and SNAFUs will conspire to make his path cross with Harry's soon enough.


	12. Chapter 12

Warning: The following chapter contains character death and some gore. You should read it anyway

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter Twelve

~000~

SOLDIER Director Lazard was dining out his lunch today. He normally didn't eat outside of the Tower unless he was meeting someone special, but he really wanted to get out today. There was something suffocating about the ShinRa Tower. He managed to ignore it most of the time, but every once in a while it got to him. When that happened he found some way to leave for a few hours. Some days, when it was especially bad, he went home early.

He liked dining at Lovely Time. The establishment's atrocious name aside, it served wonderful food in conscious-able small portions. It was quiet, it was discreet, and he had yet to run into anyone he knew there. The clientele was largely female, most wives of the businessmen that could afford to live Above Plate.

That changed today. He was sitting alone in his booth, lingering over his cappuccino and looking over some notes he'd made for an interview with Hojo that afternoon when he heard a familiar voice. He flicked his eyes around the restaurant, and caught sight of Reeve and Scarlet in the corner booth. His eyebrows went up.

He was unaware that there was any connection between them. Scarlet was a notorious pragmatist who didn't care what she had to do to accomplish her goals (which was the actual secret to her success, not her appearance), and Reeve was a profoundly out of place moralist in the company's hierarchy.

Scarlet happened to look up from her soup just then and spotted him. He was expecting a guilty look, but she smiled instead, as though it were perfectly usual that she be lunching with Reeve. She said something to Reeve, who turned and also took note of him. She waved him over.

Lazard gathered his things and carefully balanced his coffee in his palm. He made his way over to their table. Scarlet scooted to one side to make room for him on the plush bench. He sat. He was on friendly though impersonal terms with Scarlet. His Department worked closely with hers, and he appreciated that she took time to hear his opinions about what sort of weapons he wanted the SOLDIERS using. Gaia knew the Science Department never cared one whit for his opinion.

"Lazard! I'm so glad we ran into each other! Reeve and I were talking about something that we think might interest you."

"Oh?" He sipped his cappuccino and indicated that she should expand on that. Scarlet smiled and nodded to Reeve.

"You tell him."

Reeve looked mildly uncomfortable, but consented, "Well, some months ago Scarlet and I realized that we have some common goals. You are aware of the Mako shortage?"

"Who isn't?"

"Right, exactly, and I think that you know as well as we do that it will never get any better. It can only get worse from here on." At these words a sort of grim shadow fell over them. None of them had said it aloud before, but it was true. The Great Age of Mako was ending whether they were ready or not. Reeve cleared his throat, "Well, as Head of Urban Development it is imperative for me to pioneer Mako-independent plans. Scarlet relies on available materials for design and production, and she is uncomfortable designing Mako-based weaponry in the face of a shortage. Both of us have presented inexpensive and viable alternatives to the President, but he has vetoed them on the basis that they are Mako-free."

Lazard nodded, "I have also urged him to fund and support research into alternative energy, but he insists that Mako will last. He appears to believe that we haven't tapped into all of the Planet's resources yet, despite evidence to the contrary."

"I don't mean this in a treasonous way," Scarlet spoke, "but I don't think I'm remiss in understanding that the President's ability to reason has been in some way affected by his…health."

"Or lack thereof," Lazard added softly.

"Exactly."

They stopped to ponder that upsetting concept. Were they being led by a mad man? The President had once been a charismatic and ambitious young man intent on making his fortune by providing a higher living standard for the world. He had bright ideas, but more importantly he knew how to manage and delegate authority. He was a natural leader, and once upon a time it was unthinkable to work with anyone else.

If the President was incapacitated by strokes half the year, which he was, then…who was making executive decisions?

"Anyway, Scarlet and I have been meeting regularly to share ideas and collaborate on projects that are Mako-free. The President may not approve of them now, but we are doing our best to lay the groundwork for them so that the Planet doesn't fall into shambles when our supplies finally do expire."

"And you want me to join you?"

"If you want to," Scarlet said, meeting his eyes and holding them. He read in them that she was just as afraid as he was of what the future held, and was desperate for any way to get ahead of the curve.

He nodded.

"I'll work with you. This is important, not just for our sakes but for everyone, especially those living beneath the Plate," he said to Reeve. Reeve nodded, chin firm. Lazard was impressed. He had never seen the man display a backbone before.

"Like we said, we meet once a week or so. My office is just a floor above yours, Lazard, so I can come and get you when we are meeting. We can go together. If we're lucky, the secretaries will assume that we are having an affair or something else equally ridiculous. That should remove some suspicion from us."

Lazard agreed and then excused himself. He needed to be back at the office to attend to some small errands before his meeting.

During the long walk back to the ShinRa Tower, he thought about what they'd said. He remembered the first time he actually paid attention to how much the Mako injections cost, and the ensuing passionate speech he made to the President. At the time, he naively believed that the President would be moved by the fact that the frankly unnecessary injections cost what amounted to 50% of the Planet's annual taxes. It was ridiculous. Only a small percentage of the SOLDIERS actually needed regular injections.

The President waved his concern away. He should have known then that the President had lost his mind, but instead he came to him again when he discovered that researchers were assigned to positions for the development of Mako instead of to, say, research cures for the many diseases that now ran rampant among the population, particularly those living in the slums. The President's lack of concern after his second speech finally revealed that he didn't actually care about the people. As long as he was comfortable, he didn't care if the people dropped like flies in the streets.

Lazard could only imagine how outraged Reeve must have felt all these long years. The slums were never meant to be used as long-term housing. They were a temporary solution for factory and construction workers when Midgar was first reformed into a reactor. But when the Plate was complete, the cost of building was so high that those it was built for could not afford to live on it. As a consequence, the slums were created. Close living conditions, unemployment, food shortages, bad air, and a myriad of other discomforts and dangers led to the sorry picture they now made.

Perhaps the greatest outrage of all was that none of this was officially recorded. No one now living in the Slums knew that they were meant to live Above Plate. No one knew that Mako polluted the air and polluted the water. No one knew that Mako killed children and killed livestock, or that it had infected the soil like salt, making it near infertile. It was no wonder the population was shrinking.

Lazard could tolerate this state of affairs no longer, and the Mako shortage was only a handy mechanism to bring things to a head. He resolved to speak with Sephiroth.

~000~

Lazard left his office in order and peace. He returned to find it in shambles. His secretary was in tears and he could hear SOLDIERS shouting at one another from the nearby training facility. He found Angeal Hewley fuming in his office. Though there was no sign of anger on his face, his strong hands had bent the metal armrests of the visitor's chair into crumpled little wires.

"Angeal? What's happened?"

"It's Genesis. He's missing."

Lazard frowned, "Again?"

Genesis had gone A.W.O.L. approximately 10 times since his induction into the army. He appeared unmoved by the punishments that followed these disappearances, and he was too valuable to be discharged.

"It's different this time. He left a note," he took something from his pocket and offered it to Lazard. Lazard took it and read it. Genesis had beautiful handwriting, and with it he'd written a short note. All it said was,

"_I wish to die. Do not follow me. I pray that the Goddess protect you as she has me."_

"When did you find this?"

"Two hours ago, but who knows when he wrote it," Angeal stood and began to pace. His heavy steps echoed in the metal-walled office. "Half the SOLDIERS found out in the first hour, how I don't know, and they went off looking for him. Now the other half knows. Sephiroth left as soon as I showed this to him. Genesis…he hasn't been right these past few weeks. Sephiroth and I thought we were doing alright keeping an eye on him, but apparently not."

"Why aren't you out looking for him as well?" there was no malice in the question.

Angeal put his hand on his mouth, and then dragged it slowly down to rest against his neck. The gesture was vulnerable. "I don't know what to do. He wasn't right in the head, but… what if he was? What if all he wants is to choose his own death? If that's true, as his friend, I can't disrespect his decision and stop him. He wanted to do this alone."

"You're conflicted."

"Yeah. Yes. I don't know what's right. I never know what's right when it comes to Genesis."

Lazard lowered his eyes. Genesis was famously difficult to get along with, but when the going was good he was like a ray of sunshine in the SOLDIER program. He was so full of poetry and song, so cultured, so beautiful. Beside the statue-like beauty of Sephiroth and Angeal's virtuous habits, he was fully alive, fully human, and fully flawed.

"I understand. If Genesis isn't found by tonight, I will recall all unauthorized SOLDIERS and assemble a team of Turks. Regardless of the situation we still need to recover his body."

Angeal choked. Lazard moved to go to him, but Angeal held up a hand and, covering his eyes, left. The door slammed shut behind him.

~000~

Sephiroth was called from the Midgar desert to the laboratories for an impromptu round of tests. He was given some kind of vague crap about their fluid samples from him expiring. He knew damn well that their facilities were outfitted to withstand the apocalypse.

He considered blowing Hojo off; finding Genesis was his first priority at the moment. But he knew that refusal would only result in a team of Turks being dispatched with sedatives. He was the most effective warrior on the Planet, and yet somehow the Turks always managed to sedate him. One of these days he was going to crack their database and find out their training methods.

As a result, he was lying flat on his back in the labs having his blood drawn when Angeal texted to alert him that Genesis' body was found. He was dead. There was no remark on the condition of the corpse, but Sephiroth could feel that it wasn't good.

He was right. Genesis' body was taken to the laboratories for the 'records', whatever that meant. His body was being taken to its preserving case just as he was exiting. If it wasn't for the scraps of red leather, all that was left of his uniform, clinging to him, Sephiroth wouldn't have recognized his childhood friend.

Sorrow rose thick in his throat. He'd known this day was coming, as had Angeal and everyone else personally acquainted with Genesis, but that didn't make it any easier to bear now that it had come. Genesis was twenty-four years old, healthy, and beautiful. He wasn't supposed to be dead. Not so soon.

He was already light-headed from the loss of blood; the elevator ride to his apartment made it worse. He collapsed in bed and wished Simone was there. His desire to see her was no longer sexual. He just wanted to lay his head on her soft stomach and listen to her insides vibrating gently beneath his ear. He wanted to feel her touching his hair in that special way of hers.

Someone knocked on his door. He didn't stir. He didn't know if he could stand, and he didn't want to talk to anyone.

His phone rang. He dug it out of his pocket and answered without checking the caller I.D. Personal tragedy aside, he was still the General.

"Sephiroth? Where are you? I'm at your apartment. I…I don't want to be alone right now. Can you come here, please?"

"I'm here. Give me a moment."

Angeal hung up. Sephiroth wanted to be alone, but Angeal needed him. Angeal was always closer to Genesis than he was. They'd known each other their whole lives. He couldn't imagine what Angeal was feeling.

He carefully lowered his feet to the floor and then levered his torso into an upright position. A powerful wave of nausea rose inside of him, and he rushed to the restroom. He vomited.

He rinsed his mouth and fumbled with the toothpaste. He spilled a good deal in the effort of getting some onto his tooth brush. His hands were shaking like a junkie in withdrawal. He had lost men in battle; he had lost hundreds of thousands of men. He had lost men he liked and men he couldn't stand the sight of. But he had never lost a friend. It felt as though someone had punched a hole in his chest and removed something vital. Without it he was slowly perishing.

Angeal was white and trembling on his door step. Sephiroth let him in and offered him water.

They sat on his sofa drinking water out of plastic bottles until they were empty and their stomachs felt uncomfortably full. And then, as though it was the most natural thing in the world, Angeal leaned over and kissed him. Sephiroth allowed this. He wasn't going to stop Angeal and ask him why he wasn't with his girlfriend Penelope, or if he really thought this was a good idea.

~000~

"You will never believe what happened yesterday!" Zack practically shouted, pouncing on Harry as he exited his class on Wutain customs. He jumped and then smiled when he saw who it was. He did his best to follow Reno's advice and smile more. It disarmed people, and had the added bonus of making him look less old.

"What?"

"Remember how all the SOLDIERS were going nuts and nobody would tell us why?" Harry nodded, "I found out. Carol told me when I did a coffee run for the office this morning. You will never believe it."

Zack was quickly becoming more sober. Harry knew that the news wasn't good.

"Commander Rhapsodos died. Carol wouldn't tell me how or why, it was pretty gruesome. I guess he was a really popular guy, because the SOLDIERS are really cut up about it. You should have seen the training facility. I had to get something from Kunsel, that guy I told you about from my Nibel Language class, and it looked like they let a bunch of monsters run rampant. There are gouges in the walls and scrapes and all kinds of damage. Half the lights were smashed and all the cameras were torn clean off the walls. I couldn't believe my eyes."

"I…wow. That's horrible."

"Yeah. I never met the guy, but he was the redhead you sometimes see on the posters."

"Oh. Then he must have been close to…"

"The General? Yeah. I heard they were best friends or something along those lines."

"Shit."

Harry hoped that Sephiroth had found someone to take comfort in. He had no right to make assumptions, but Sephiroth struck him as a man that did not make friends lightly. The loss of Genesis must have been a serious blow.

"Harry? Are you okay?" Zack put his hand on his shoulder and Harry gave him a wan smile.

"Sorry; I just feel sad about this. Genesis was a good warrior. He was so young. Thanks for telling me; I have to get to combat, but I'll see you at dinner, alright?"

"Alright," There was something thoughtful in Zack's eyes as he released his shoulder. Harry averted his eyes and hurried away before he was late. In class he thought about that look Zack gave him. Despite his exuberant way of carrying himself and the childlike stream-of-consciousness that was his speech, Harry knew that Zack was very intelligent, possibly more intelligent than Harry was at that age. He had that special kind of intellect that allows you to see and interpret the intentions and emotions of others, possibly the most important sort of intellect one can possess.

Harry had to smile a little. Heaven forbid the true force of Zack be unleashed upon the world.

Harry had other things to worry about besides Zack catching onto his feelings for Sephiroth. At the end of the month he and the others of his platoon were scheduled to be injected with a tiny drop of Mako to test for adverse reactions. Though it was never said outright, most cadets knew that an adverse reaction usually entailed a painful death.

Sometimes Harry wondered why he even got involved in the gnarled and thorny conundrum that was ShinRa. He could have lived out his days in a monastery praying to the Universe for blessings upon the planet even as it was destroyed around him. He could have stayed in the Northern Crater and let his hands become cracked and red, his face chapped from wind, and his hair bleached of all color by the intense sun of that place, fighting snow men until he died. Instead he was here, risking his life for an injection to keep up appearances.

What if he died? What if that one drop of Mako killed him? Then what would he have to show for himself? He had accomplished some amazing things in his life, but did any of them mean anything to him beyond a check mark on a cosmic to-do list?

He had come a long way from that final face-off with Voldemort, and he wasn't sure that it was in the right direction.

~000~

"I mean, you're such a super normal guy, but you do such un-normal things. And you're so- what? Unpredictable. You're fighting style is-"

Harry tuned Zack out. He was seated between Zack and a guy named Ken that hated his guts. They were in the waiting room, waiting, waiting, and waiting to be tested. Harry didn't understand what was taking so long. How hard could it be to inject a drop of Mako, put the cadet in a different waiting room, and get on with it? Instead, they appeared to be injecting each cadet individually and then observing them closely for thirty minutes.

The fact that the other cadets were forced to cancel their classes for that day and wait in the adjacent room with absolutely nothing to do while they waited could only be some kind of psychological test. It would explain why the cadets were not called in any real order.

The room was a metal cube, lined and ribbed with metal benches. If someone sighed, it echoed. At the moment it was very loud, because most of the cadets were having conversations just to have something to do. Very faintly, beneath the cacophony, you could hear the faint tinkle of the music playing in the background.

Somehow he knew that it was his turn next, and he stared fixedly at the clock hung on the wall across from him. Twenty minutes, fifteen minutes, ten, five, four, three, two, one…

"Potter, Harry."

He was right. Harry stood, saluted, and approached to present his I.D. The nurse, a tall woman with short-cropped hair dyed a stunning shade of fuchsia, scanned his I.D. thoroughly before nodding. She escorted him through the metal doors and into the laboratories.

He was led to a small cell of a room. There was a metal examining table papered in white. He was instructed to remove his shirt. He did. He was told to sit. He did. He was told to wait. He nodded and was left alone. He tried to relax. And then he saw it, the injection needle. It sat on the rolling table, cloaked in silence. It looked like a deep-sea creature pretending to be an inanimate object, crouching in wait of its prey. It was filled with only the tiniest bit of Mako, but even that could kill him.

It glowed green.

He wasn't given much time to dwell on this. The door banged open and a disgusting little man entered with the nurse. He was short and obviously aged, though his hair was still dark. He reminded Harry of a caricature of Snape, only shorter and with glasses.

"Well, well, well. We don't get many of you, Mr. Potter."

"Sir?"

"Your physical says that you are in perfect condition, and unless you have received an internal injury since then, I would have to say that I agree with that assessment just by looking at you. Where did you come from, I wonder?"

"Kalm, Sir."

The doctor began to prep his arm. The alcohol was strong and stung his nose. It had been months since he'd had a drink. Though he spent every weekend he could with Rude, neither of them felt the need to drink when together.

There was a loud noise, and then a sting. Harry realized his arm had been slapped. His veins stood up pink and raging. He raised his eyes to the ceiling. He didn't want to watch.

"Are you afraid of needles?"

"No, sir."

The doctor made a curious sound, and then stabbed him with the needle. Harry felt the pressure of something entering his blood stream and closed his eyes. He prayed to any deity listening that, should he die, he be reunited with his loved ones in the after life.

When he opened his eyes it was to see astonishment on the faces of the doctor and nurse.

He frowned. He felt fine. He looked down at himself. He looked fine. There was nothing out of the ordinary. No swelling, no bruises, no weird new limbs.

"Is something the matter?"

"Your eyes…"

Harry clapped his hands to his face. His eyes felt fine. They didn't even tingle. "What's wrong with them?"

"They didn't change at all," he said with special gravity.

Harry was confused, and then he remembered the faint greenish hue that the eyes of the others had. It was only the new guys that didn't have it, because they hadn't been tested yet. Shit, shit, shit.

"I…how often does this happen?"

"Never. The melanin in the eye is very sensitive to Mako, and usually absorbs it the fastest. Your body could be slow, though. We'll wait the full 30 minutes and see."

What followed was the most uncomfortable half hour of Harry's life. He did his best to look comfortable, but the wide-eyed fascination of the doctor and reluctant interest on the part of the nurse made him feel extremely self-conscious. He ended up picking a place on the wall and staring at it.

Because he was staring it took him some time to realize that the discomfort in his eyes was real and not merely strain. He gently pressed the skin beneath his socket and winced. Stabbing pain began shooting through the delicate network of nerves and veins in his eyeballs. He clutched at his forehead and bit his lip, trying his best to cope with the sensation.

The doctor forced him to recite everything he was feeling, all of which he recorded on a clipboard. The pain became intense, and then Harry fainted or passed out. He didn't know which.

When he came to he was lying on a different bed. A different nurse was waiting with him, this one with a perfectly sensible bun of brown hair. With her small stature, large glasses, and stick-out ears, she looked like a mouse.

She noticed that he had become conscious and did some basic tests, checking his blood pressure, breathing, and so on. She said that there was nothing wrong with him; it was just that his body had fought extraordinarily hard against processing Mako, and almost managed to reject it. She showed him a cotton pad with a tiny speck of green on it hermetically sealed in a plastic bag. He had excreted it from his tear ducts, but the rest of it managed to stay put.

He was free to go as soon as he felt well enough to stand without assistance.

He kept close to the wall as he made his way down the hall and to the exit in case he felt dizzy or his legs gave out. He was so focused on staying out of the way of the rushing aides and men in white coats that he was almost to the exit before he noticed someone watching him.

Sephiroth stood in the doorway to one of the rooms, watching him with wide green eyes. They were filled with something like shock.

The doors shut behind him, taking him out of the General's sight. Zack was waiting for him on the other side. His eyes were now faintly green. Harry sat and rested for while, listening to Zack describe his own experience with Mako, which the nurse had told him was normal.

Harry nodded and scratched at the stubble of his chin in a way that was meant to signify deep ratiocination, but his heart and thoughts were hung up on the memory of green eyes and surprise

~000~

Harry still felt weak for the rest of the week. His eyes ached at night when he was trying to sleep, and as a consequence he only slept fitfully. This led to long sessions of inattention in class. His sergeants noticed, as did the other cadets. Harry supposed that it would have been hard to miss. When his eyes hurt the worst, they glowed a wicked green that set his teeth on edge.

He hoped that his body would become accustomed to the Mako soon, because the thought of spending the rest of his life in discomfort was almost worse than dying from an adverse reaction.

The worst was the itching. It came suddenly and without warning, filling him with the strong urge to strip naked and scratch his skin raw.

To take his mind off of this, he began slipping away in the evenings to explore the slums and even ventured into the desert once or twice to battle the monsters there. The slums had backslid somewhat since his absence, but the trash situation was still functioning. It was against the rules to be out of his barracks after dark, but he didn't care. Anything was better than lying there in the dark trying not to claw his eyes out. The endorphin rush from killing monsters actually made the pain abate somewhat. He took what he could get. The military clinic refused to sell him pain killers.

One weekend while wandering through the Slums near the reactor in search of monsters, Harry crossed paths with Sephiroth.

~000~

Sephiroth refused to meet with the therapist assigned to him and Angeal for grief counseling. He knew that Angeal found talking about the issue out loud helpful, but Sephiroth couldn't bear having his private thoughts recorded and shared with the Science Department. There was no such thing as confidentiality when it came to him.

Instead he self-medicated by going out every night and finding something to kill. Sometimes he stayed within the slums, but there was almost nothing there. Someone had come through and slashed the monster population down to rats and mongrels, or perhaps the street gangs were using their weapons for something useful for once.

Some nights he didn't want to be violent. Some nights a long walk was enough to soothe him. On those nights he usually did circuits of the reactor until he was tired. The hum of the Mako in the pipes was soothing, and the sharp smell reminded him of Genesis. He remembered how excited Genesis was about enhancements. He didn't know then that the experiments would destroy his peace of mind.

He almost never saw anyone during his walks. He was disguised, but the animal in the slum people made them avoid him. They knew he was a predator, at the top of the food chain.

Perhaps he convinced himself that he really was alone in the city during those walks. That was why it was such a surprise when, one night, he rounded the corner of the reactor and saw someone standing against the railing. There was a sword strapped to his back, but his pose was neutral and non-threatening. He was not observing prey, only looking at the ant-like movements of the people below. There was something familiar about him.

He must have heard Sephiroth approach because he lifted his head and met his eyes.

Sephiroth felt stunned and confused. It was the waiter from the Northern Crater! He hadn't been mistaken when he thought he saw him in the laboratories, wearing the uniform of a soldier, and perhaps even that night in the lobby! Was he a soldier now?

But what was he doing here? It was a Saturday night; shouldn't he be carousing with the other men?

Harry saluted, "Sir!"

"At ease."

They stood ten feet from one another, each sizing the other up. And then Sephiroth remembered that you needed a special pass to be admitted into the reactor, a formality that was waived in his case but wouldn't be in the case of the soldier.

"Are you authorized to be here, soldier?"

"Yes, sir."

And to Sephiroth's surprise, he dug into his pocket and produced a pass. He accepted it and looked it over. It appeared to be legitimate. He fixed Harry with a keen eye.

"When did you join the army, soldier?"

"Um...," he tilted his head back and calculated. Sephiroth tried not to look at his throat, "I'd say half a year ago, sir."

"I see. As you were." And with that he strode on. He didn't want to linger in his company. There was something about his eyes that was different. Mako had altered their beauty, perverting them with its poison. He tried to calm himself, but he was puzzled and twisted up inside. He was filled with the warring desires of entering the desert to decimate monsters until his body burned with exertion and the desire to return to Harry and demand to know what kind of person he was and how he came to be here. And how did he get authorization to be in the reactor? He was not a technician, he was a soldier. He had more questions than he had time to reason answers for.

Harry had met his eyes. Few soldiers had that kind of boldness, and the boldness of it stayed with him.

He entered the desert and fought until exhaustion led him half-blind back to the ShinRa Tower, where he fell asleep still dressed and gory.

Unbeknownst to him, Harry Potter nearly had a heart attack as soon as he left, and resolved to be more careful about his night-time jaunts. The last thing he needed on top of everything else was the suspicion that he was a terrorist. Thank god he thought to steal an authorization pass!

~000~

The next day something that was a long time in coming finally occurred. Zack Fair was singled out by the sergeants to be offered as a protégé for the SOLDIER Firsts. It would appear that his long hours of extra training and talent had finally been noticed.

Harry was happy for him and returned every exuberant hug with long-suffering patience. Zack was excited enough for ten people. Harry knew that Zack had his eye on one particular First, though. Ever since he'd read about Angeal Hewley's dedication to preserving the ideals of honor and commitment in the SOLDIER Program, he'd longed to work with him. It helped that he was a Commander, the size of a small mountain, and overall an extremely well-like and well-respected man.

Harry never told him that he knew Angeal, much less that they'd slept together. Angeal was officially straight, and what he did in the Northern Crater and similarly out-of-the-way locations was his private business. Harry just hoped that, if Zack was chosen by Angeal, that they didn't cross paths. He had lost Angeal's PHS number ages ago and felt slightly guilty about never calling him. They had a real connection, but he was in a tenuous relationship with Rude now and didn't want to upset that.

He knew immediately that Zack got what he wanted when he stepped onto the track they used for endurance tests and saw Zack's beaming face. They weren't supposed to talk, but the sergeant wasn't there yet.

"Did you get selected this morning?" Harry asked. He already knew, but it was nice for Zack to be asked.

Zack glowed in his direction. "Angeal Hewley picked me! I can't believe it! There were 30 other guys put up for selection, and he only picks the best!"

"Wow, Zack! I knew you could do it!"

"I'm really glad, but I'm also so nervous I can't think straight. I am meeting him during our lunch break, and holy shit I do not know what I will do or what I can possibly say to him. He's Angeal Hewley! He's a hero, and he's best friends with the General! Maybe he'll introduce me. That would be incredible."

Harry nodded. Their sergeant had arrived. He knew Zack was filled to the bursting with things to say. They would keep until after.

As he ran as fast as he could around the track, he thought about Angeal. Should he make the first move and try to reconnect with him platonically? Or should he wait and see if their paths even crossed?

It turned out to be a moot point. Zack came back to the barracks that night full of information, some of which happened to be that Angeal was currently dating a woman named Penelope in the Turks.

Something must have shown on Harry's face at the news because Zack stopped talking and gave him a keen look. They were alone at present with the exception of a snoring bunk mate. The others were still in the mess hall playing cards and goofing off.

"Harry, do you…know something about Angeal?"

"What? No. No, of course not. I've never even seen him in person, just posters."

"You know, Harry, you don't have to lie to me," Zack bit his lip, "I know that you have _secrets, _and you don't have to tell me them if you don't want to. I just want you to know that if you ever want to talk to me about something I won't tell anybody or judge you. You're my friend, and that comes first."

Harry smiled. It was false, and Zack knew and Harry knew that it was insincere, but the subject was dropped.

~000~

Against his better judgment, Harry went out to fight monsters that night. All this stuff about Angeal was stirring him up inside, and he needed to let off some steam. He envied the other men that could accomplish this by a few hours punching a bag in the gym or lifting weights. Harry needed a real threat to his life to get focused.

He was weak from the endurance tests and had left his Materia in his rucksack by mistake. He didn't want to turn back, though. He was at the top of his combat class and had become quite skilled with his sword. He reasoned that he could go a night without his safety net. He'd just be careful and not take on anything too big.

It was darker out than usual that night. The seasons were turning, and night now fell an hour earlier.

He kept his ears and eyes open, straining his senses for the whisper of movement. He kept close to the city this night.

There was a howl, and he surged in the direction it came from. His sword was drawn and at the ready. It was dark, but his ears illustrated the image of a monster lunging for him. He slashed in and up, splitting its head in two. He felt it shrivel as the acid inside of it dissolved the corpse.

He had just bent to collect the potion that the creature had swallowed whilst alive when there was a swoosh of wind as the air moved. He spun around but it was too late. Something large, much larger than anything else he'd ever encountered this close to the city was upon him. Teeth tore into his shoulder.

He got out his knife from his belt and began to stab the belly of the creature. The teeth in his shoulder clamped down harder and then there was a tearing pain as the beast jerked its head away from him, taking with it a mouthful of his muscle.

Harry howled. He hadn't felt such intense pain in so long. His mind flashed back to his first Cruciatus in that horrible graveyard when he was fourteen. The pain doubled when the beast sank its mouth into his face. A burst of magic came from inside of him and blasted the monster away. Harry didn't know how he'd channeled it, but he had.

Unfortunately, in the process of being pushed away by magic, the monster's claws caught on his stomach and tore straight through his uniform into his skin. Harry screamed as he felt a rope of his intestines snake out. He clutched madly at it, pushing it back inside. He didn't know what to do next. The monster was pacing nearby, preparing to rush him again.

He was too weak to lift his sword. All he had was his knife and his magic's unpredictable support. Blood dripped steadily into his eyes and mouth from the mess on his face. He felt nauseous. Would he live through this?

The monster charged again and Harry thrust out his knife. It sank deep within the creature's chest cavity. Harry cried out as its weight landed on top of him, pinning him to the hard sand of the desert.

He pushed and wriggled as best as he could, the smallest move sending paralyzing pain through his entire nervous system. His shoulder felt cold and hot at once, and he could feel sand penetrating the wound on his face, rubbing it raw.

He sobbed with helplessness. He was going to die because he couldn't be bothered to bring his Materia with him. He was going to die without ever doing anything good for the people of this planet.

~000~

End Chapter Twelve

Maybe I should just rename this "Everyone Sleeps with Everyone Else". Honestly, what has become of my artistic conscience?


	13. Chapter 13

Author's Note: Hey, guess what? If you leave an anonymous review with a question, I can't answer it. And guess what else? If you disabled private messages and then leave a review with a question, I can't respond to that either. So…yeah. Get an account. Enable messaging. Or just don't ask me questions, because it breaks my fucking heart when I can't answer them. Seriously. I act tough but I'm a huge softy.

~000~

**Vivified**

Chapter Thirteen

~000~

Harry was floating in a colorless void, utterly alone.

He felt no pain, and all evidence of his recent injuries was gone. He held his hands in front of his face and saw that the many little scars and scrapes that covered them were gone. What was this place?

And then he was no longer alone. A woman was there. She was tall and pale and had dark rings under her eyes. Her hair was shaved close to her head; it glinted silver when she moved. Someone had run her through with something sharp, because there was a hole in her stomach. He could see the white light around them shining through it from the other side.

"Hello, Harry."

"Hello. Where is this place?"

"This is the Lifestream. I have made this pocket for you, for us to have somewhere to speak."

"Who are you?"

"I am Gaia, this Planet."

If this was the embodiment of the Planet, things were worse than he'd thought. She looked like the living dead. Her hands trembled, and her eyes were dull with pain. Weariness surrounded her like a cloak. There was no color to her lips, her cheeks.

"I need your help, Harry. That is why I brought you here. You are an alien, and I would not normally request someone who is not my child to do me service, but my situation is desperate."

He nodded, "I don't mind. Just tell me what I can do to help you."

"You have already defeated my old enemy, Jenova. But I am dying still. The wickedness she inspired continues to drain me of my lifeblood."

Harry's eyes went wide as something fitted neatly into place for him. The Reactors! Mako was a part of the Planet necessary for its survival, and the consumption of Mako was killing the Planet. He hadn't thought it was this serious. He thought it was polluting the Planet's resources, yes, but he didn't suspect that the loss of Mako would lead to the literal end of the world.

"How much time do we have?"

"Not long. There is so little of me left. It will take many long centuries to rebuild what has been destroyed."

He swallowed. There was so little Mako left. There was no way around that fact; if he was going to help her, he needed to begin immediately. He thought of his body, and the state it was in. How was he going to survive that?

Like a mind-reader, the woman said, "A man has already found you and saved your life. You are badly injured and require surgery on your shoulder and stomach, but you are alive and will recover."

"What man?"

She smiled, "The man you were brought here to love."

"I…I was brought here for that?"

She winced suddenly, grabbing at her belly where the wound was. It seemed to grow larger as he watched in horror. Blood seeped over the edges, dripping down to pool around her feet. When she recovered, she whispered,

"You were brought here for many reasons. The chief of those was that your home planet could not support you. Your planet has passed from the feral age of warriors and into the age of the scholar. You would have been successful, but that half of you that burns to fight would be unsatisfied, and you would become bitter and old before your time. You were brought to this planet specifically because of what you can do to help me. I was hurt by an alien, and now I need another to repair me."

"Then what is this about a man and love?"

"It happens that there is someone very much like you here, but he has the opposite problem as you. He longs to be softer, but he is valued only for his strength. You can save him. Can you blame me for a little match-making? I am a dying woman and deserve some amusement."

Harry's mouth worked, but he couldn't find the words to express what he wanted to say. How was he supposed to react to something like this? Saving the planet he was alright with. He was used to saving people, comfortable doing it. But saving somebody by…loving them? That was new, and he felt nervous and terrified and excited and a million other things all at once.

"Who is it?"

She grinned, "That would be telling. I want you to do whatever you think is right to preserve me and those that live upon me. Goodbye."

"Wait!"

It was too late. He was waking up.

~000~

Sephiroth was going about his business, fighting monsters in the desert to burn off steam, when he heard a scream. Thinking that it was either a civilian or a pair of monsters having a fight, he followed the sound of it.

As he drew closer he came across evidence of a slain monster and frowned. Was it one of his men out here? It was possible they had come out to practice and ended up fighting something beyond their skill. This usually happened in the training simulators, but he wouldn't put it past a recently-promoted Third. There had been some real hot-heads recently added to the roster.

He saw a very large unknown breed of monster charge a fallen figure that was badly bloodied. At the last moment the figure thrust up a knife into the monster's chest cavity, a blow it would not survive. Its weight landed on the figure. He approached cautiously and heard something like great, gasping breaths leaving the figure's throat. The noise sounded painful to make.

And then the sobs steadily faded and the figure went limp.

He rushed closer, now seriously concerned. The monster was beginning to dissolve. He pushed it roughly to the side, revealing the body of a man. He was not wearing the uniform of a SOLDIER, but he _was _wearing the fatigues of the general army. Sephiroth assessed the damage. The man's face was a bloody mass, as was his shoulder. It looked like a sizable amount of flesh was missing, and blood was steadily flowing from it, staining the sand beneath him black.

The worst of it was his torso, which was torn open like a paper bag.

He looked around for monsters and, finding none, began to sift through his pockets for a cure of some kind to give the man. He was still alive, only unconscious. He decided on a Cure and three potions to stave the bleeding and repair the worst of the damage. The man would have to be reopened at the hospital so that any debris in the wounds could be cleaned.

He hoisted the man in his arms and ran. He was a very fast runner, and made it to the gates in less than two minutes. There he wasted a minute strategizing. He could take the train, which would be half-an-hour and might not even be still running at this hour. He could never remember their stupid weekend schedule. Then there was the elevator, but he hadn't brought his pass with him and wasn't in the mood to hack the control pad.

In a fit of genius, he bypassed actually entering the city at all. He scaled the outer wall of the city instead. It was imperative that he reach the Upper Plate. The so-called clinics in the slums only made things worse, and this was one of his soldiers. He had a duty as his general to give him the best chance of survival possible.

And then he was going to shout at him himself for being stupid enough to go into the desert to fight monsters. He was probably top of his combat class or some such nonsense and got a little full of himself, or he was dared and didn't want to called a coward.

No matter the circumstances, Sephiroth was officially pissed off. Why couldn't his men just behave themselves? Wasn't the kitchen fiasco last year bad enough? Not to mention what happened on that Chocobo farm in Mideel. Why did he constantly have to clean up their shit?

He sighed and shifted the man in his arms, careful to keep his torso as stable as possible. The cure had only created an artificial and very thin layer of skin over the wound to hold him together, and he didn't want to puncture it by mistake. He was now on the Upper Plate and once again reviewing his options. There was a large hospital for civilians, but their surgeons did things at a slower pace than the military doctors.

He decided to take the soldier to the military care center in the Tower.

It was nearing three in the morning. Only one receptionist was still on duty, and she was dozing at her desk. The security guards averted their eyes when Sephiroth came charging in. They were paid to mind their own business when it came to the affairs of those that lived inside the Tower.

Greenburg was still on duty when he burst into his clinic. He was reviewing his potion stock with his assistant, whose name Sephiroth could never remember.

"Sephiroth! I wasn't expecting you-" and then Greenburg realized what the mass of black was in Sephiroth's arms, "Oh shit. Come with me. I'll get started right away. What's wrong with him?"

"His torso was torn open. This is artificial skin. His shoulder was also badly torn, and I'm not sure how severe the facial damage is. There may be additional smaller injuries that I'm not aware of."

Greenburg nodded, spreading a fresh plastic wrapping over the table. Sephiroth carefully laid the soldier out. In the bright fluorescents of the hospital room, he could get a much better look at the soldier. There was something familiar about the way his dark hair curled around his ears and brushed shoulders. Who did he know with hair like that?

There was a gash through the lips, but they looked familiar as well. They were pink; they looked soft. Greenburg had his back turned, organizing his implements. Sephiroth touched them with the pad of his thumb. They gave way easily like a pillow-y sofa. Something hot flashed through him, and he snatched his finger away. When did he turn into a pervert?

"Hey Sarah, I know its late, but there's a bit of an emergency…can you come down here and help me? I have to do some delicate facial work and I want your eye. Oh, thank you so much. I owe you."

Greenburg hung up and turned to smile at Sephiroth.

"I'll have him fixed up in no time. He'll need maybe two weeks to recover, but he'll make it."

Sephiroth nodded, "Thank you. I appreciate the care you take with my men."

He was at the door when Greenburg called, "Hey, here's a copy of his I.D. card, so you can have someone prepare a report."

Sephiroth was ashamed to realize that he hadn't thought to look for an I.D. He accepted the sheet of paper with a polite nod and left. In the hall directly outside he unfolded it. The photo was grainy and the copy poor overall, but the number was legible. He squinted at the face and then frowned when he realized who it was.

It was Harry Potter, the soldier he caught on the reactor and remembered from the Crater. Harry hadn't struck him as the blind idiot type. What was he doing alone in the desert? He thought back, reviewing what he'd seen. The monster was just as injured as Harry, and the way Harry had stabbed in even though he lay bleeding and dying on the ground was…he didn't know how to describe it other than some combination of practiced and instinctual, as though Harry was accustomed to fighting monsters but not to losing.

This event gave him the impetus to begin something he had been considering off and on since he saw Harry in the lobby. It was time to run an investigation on Harry Potter, and he knew just the people to do it.

In the elevator he punched the button for the Turks. Tseng owed him a favor.

~000~

Harry awoke in an unfamiliar bed with sensors strapped all over his body. They were attached to very high-tech looking machines that flanked him like guards. He sighed. The Planet wasn't lying when she said he would survive. And then he yawned, and a nightmare of pain attacked him.

His face burned, shuddering all over with electric waves of pain, and his neck ached from the tiniest flexion of muscles. He swallowed and tears sprang into his eyes.

Fuck. Why did this hurt so badly? He tried to remember the details of his fight. It was a blur of pain and helplessness. He remembered his Materia back in his barracks. How long had he been here? If someone got curious and looked through his things, they would most likely find the Materia, and then he would be discharged for possessing it.

But perhaps that would be for the best. He now knew that he needed to pour all of his energies into saving the Planet any way he could, and that meant shutting down reactors. He groaned. Where would he even begin? There were thousands of reactors, and he wasn't stupid enough to think that just shutting them all down would be okay. It would lead to mass chaos, which meant that in addition to finding a way of turning the reactors off, he also needed to find something sustainable and non-harmful to replace it with.

A light bulb went off.

What about electricity? There was nothing actually wrong with it, and it ran on the same appliances Mako did. He resolved to research electricity as soon as he was well enough. As it was, he was stuck. He wondered if he was allowed to have visitors. He smirked. Zack would probably come and see him regardless of the rules.

The curtain surrounding his bed was suddenly jerked back, and Angeal Hewley of all unlikely people stepped inside. He was preoccupied with a foam cup of what smelled like tea in his hands and didn't immediately notice that Harry was awake. When he'd seated himself in a small plastic chair Harry didn't notice before, Harry cleared his throat.

Angeal jerked and spilled the tea on his hand. He cursed and sucked on his fingers. Harry smiled at the sight. He had been avoiding Angeal; he'd forgotten how much he liked him. It wasn't anything he did or said in particular. It was just him. He reminded him a little of Kingsley Shacklebolt for some reason.

"You're awake!"

"Yeah. Not to be rude or anything, but why are you here?"

Angeal ducked his head in embarrassment. Instead of answering outright, he said, "When did you join the army?"

Harry almost shrugged but remembered his throbbing shoulder at the last minute. His face already ached from talking, "Maybe nine months. I haven't been keeping track. A while."

Angeal bit his lip. He was conflicted, but burst out, "Why didn't you tell me you were here?"

Harry looked away and whispered, "I don't know. I…I'm sort of seeing somebody else. I didn't want to make things uncomfortable for either of us. And I'm friends with Zack, your protégé. He said you were seeing a woman named Persephone."

"Penelope, actually. And I know you're friends with Zack. That's why I'm here, actually. We were on our way to a training session when a redhead came running up to us and told him that you were in the hospital. He asked me if we could visit you just for five minutes so that he'd be able to concentrate later, knowing how you were recovering. It was logical, so I said yes. I wasn't expecting to see _you _lying wrapped in wires."

Angeal's voice became impossibly softer, and he whispered, "I missed you. We didn't have to be intimate; I would have respected your relationship."

Harry's throat seized with regret, and he coughed violently. The vibrations on his midsection brought a new type of pain into the symphony, and he gagged, seizing his midsection on instinct. He tore back the blanket and gasped. He was wrapped up like a mummy, and blood had stained the center purple.

"Oh god."

A nurse pushed back the curtain and, without acknowledging either of them, grabbed Harry's good arm and pushed a needle into the largest vein available. Harry bit his lip.

She flicked her eyes up to him and explained offhandedly, "It's for the pain."

"Thanks."

She gave him a tight smile and left as suddenly as she'd arrived.

Angeal stood and hovered a little, looking like he desperately wanted to help Harry but was obviously ill-equipped to do so. Harry began to feel better as a sort of numbness sank over him. His words slurred when he tried to tell Angeal to relax.

Angeal sat and drank his tea. "I'm going to let you rest, Harry. But there is something I want to know before I go."

Harry nodded and then stopped. It made him dizzy. He was beginning to feel very strange indeed. He felt as though he was floating again, and funny colors bled into the white curtained-off cell.

"What the hell were you doing in the desert?"

"Fighting monsters like I do every weekend," Harry answered. It came out sloppy and heavily accented with London. He distantly felt that that was a mistake, but couldn't remember why.

"W-what?"

Harry sighed. Why was this so hard to understand? As though explaining something to a child, he said, "Every weekend and sometimes during the week at night if I can't sleep, I slip out of the barracks and fight something. It helps me relax, and it certainly isn't hurting anything."

Angeal was stunned. "And…do you get hurt often, like you are now?"

Harry shook his head and then clutched at it as his brain fluid swam, "Ow. No, this is the first time, and the last if I remember to bring my stupid magic with me next time."

Angeal sat back in his chair. Harry was fading fast, and he heard Angeal's question as though from a great distance.

"You mean to tell me that you have been going out there fighting monsters for months and months and never once got hurt until now?"

"Tha's righ'."

Harry fell asleep.

Angeal sat staring at his peaceful face with wide eyes for some time. And then he decided that he needed to tell Sephiroth about this. He had no right to withhold this information from the General. He was in the elevator when a thought occurred to him. He called Zack and told him to bring Harry's bag up to his office. Zack knew not to question him, for which he was grateful.

He should have known there was something off about Harry, and now he was determined to find out what it was.

~000~

Harry was in physical therapy when he saw Angeal again. Zack visited him several times, but it was hard for him to find a block of time during the day when Harry was allowed visitors, so he couldn't come half as often as he would have liked. Reno visited him at night. Harry wasn't sure how he accomplished it, but Reno only winked whenever he asked, so he decided he didn't actually want to know.

Angeal smiled at Harry's physician and she turned pink. Harry came to realize that he wasn't the only one painfully aware of Angeal's stunning good looks.

"Hey, do you mind if I talk to Harry for a little bit? I'll help him."

"You can have five minutes."

"Thanks."

Angeal sat in her seat and watched Harry flex his shoulder in the complex range of motion ever-so-slowly over and over. It was hypnotizing. "Harry?"

"Yeah?" Angeal looked at him funny. Harry frowned. "What?"

"Is that a fake accent?"

Harry laughed nervously, "What kind of question is that?"

"Hear me out. When we met, you had this really interesting voice. I actually listened to a bunch of sound clips belonging to a linguist a friend of a friend knows, and I couldn't find it. And then when I met you again in the hospital, your spoke with a Kalm accent until you were given pain medication. Then you switched back to the strange voice. And now you speak like you're from Kalm again."

Harry said nothing. Angeal looked at him for a long time and sighed. "Fine, don't tell me. I guess I don't have any right to know. I'm your superior, but that doesn't entitle me to your personal business."

"What did you want to talk to me about?" Harry changed the subject as though the remarks about his accent never happened.

"What? Oh. I wanted to ask you if you would be interested in training with me when you're done with physical therapy. I talked to your physician and he says you'll be out of here in three days at the longest, so I figured I'd better ask you now before you got back into your routine."

Harry paused in his flexing and then continued. His face began to itch. It itched now when he was anxious about something or thinking particularly hard. The skin that had been shredded was now stained pink, the only sign that anything was the matter with it. The medical technology here weren't as advanced as Wizards, but certainly more than Muggles. He couldn't believe it when they told him that they'd just removed his old skin and grown new skin instead. It felt strange, almost alien when he touched it.

He was informed that that would change with time.

Training with Angeal was very appealing. Because he was ahead of his classmates, his sergeants usually left him alone. This was fine and all, but he wasn't progressing as a fighter. He would learn a lot from Angeal, and the thought was exciting.

But Angeal was Zack's mentor. That relationship meant something different for every student. To Zack it was very personal. Harry knew that if he started training regularly with Angeal, it would hurt Zack and possibly destroy their friendship. And in the larger scheme of things, he might not even be in the army for much longer. He was already considering desertion as a possible method of assisting the Planet.

He saw his therapist coming back through the glass walls and turned his attention back to Angeal.

"I really appreciate your offer. I'm so honored that you would even consider training me. But I can't take you up on that. I just don't have the time."

Angeal looked crestfallen, but then brightened and offered, "It wouldn't have to be a serious time commitment. You could just replace your weekend life-threatening monster hunts with training."

"I-"

Angeal leaned forward and grabbed his shoulder, "Harry?"

"Yeah?"

"Just say yes."

"…Yes."

His therapist removed and Angeal excused himself with a smile. Harry watched him go and then sighed. Zack was not going to like this.

~000~

End Chapter Thirteen

This is shorter than usual, I know. But Harry isn't dead, so…yeah.


	14. Chapter 14

~000~

**Vivified**

~000~ 

Chapter Fourteen

~000~

"Sephiroth?"

Sephiroth looked up from the report on his desk. It was a sort of progress report, detailing what the Turks had found on Harry so far. Because it was only information readily available, it contained no scandals or real detail. The most interesting aspect about it was that, because he had skipped the initial weeding-out process in basic training, the sergeants had been unable to assemble an observational psychiatric profile. They suspected that he was shy, but that was it.

It was hardly thrilling reading material.

"Angeal, please, come in."

Angeal entered and sat in the visitor's chair, leaning forward and putting his fingers together. His expression was serious, and there was a frown between his dark brows.

"Can I talk frankly with you about something?" 

"Of course, as long as you are comfortable with the fact that this office is monitored."

"That doesn't matter. Listen, there's a soldier in the hospital right now-" Angeal stopped when he saw Sephiroth's expression grow cloudy, "Do you know who I'm talking about?"

"If you're talking about Potter, then yes," he closed the folder and handed it to him, "I'm having him investigated. I found him in the desert, half-dead after an encounter with a monster that should have been far beyond his capability to kill. I'm assuming you're here because you'd also like to know what business a waiter has with fighting aptitudes like that."

"That's part of it, yes, but there is something else that doesn't add up about him."

"What?"

"His accent. I don't know how much you've talked, but, um," he flushed just slightly, "I think I might have mentioned to you once that we had an opportunity to become…better acquainted, and he had a very distinctive accent at the time. But when I speak with him now, he speaks with a perfect Kalm accent. Except, and here's where it gets interesting, when his nurse gave him some pain meds. Then he slipped right back into his old accent, and even heavier than usual. I could barely understand him. I tried tracing it, and I can't find it anywhere. It doesn't sound like anything on the planet!"

Sephiroth accepted this in silence, joining Angeal in frowning. Angeal looked through Harry's folder while they thought about this. He pointed out the weak psychiatric profile and Sephiroth grunted in affirmation.

"Do you think it would be possible to have him examined? The laboratories have a system of testing for new applicants that measures tolerance to stress, trauma, etc."

Angeal hummed, "That sounds good, but Harry's really intelligent and he might find it suspicious. I don't know how I know that, but there's something in his eyes, this _alertness, _that tells me it would be difficult to get him into a position where he would take a test like that willingly. And at this stage in the game I am going to try really hard to get and keep his trust. I don't want to have to fight Harry during this process."

"I agree. I'm glad that you are taking measures to create trust," Sephiroth commended, leaning back and crossing his legs, "I just worry that you might become emotionally compromised."

Angeal bit his lip, "That…is a legitimate concern. Harry's is a very…he's very attractive to me. I have to remind myself that I'm in a very fulfilling relationship with a woman I care for and trust."

Sephiroth looked down.

"I mean, fuck this, maybe I shouldn't try to play with fire. Maybe I should back off and you or someone we trust can get close to him instead. I could barely be appropriate with him this morning."

"This morning?"

"I visited him during his physical therapy. He's making remarkable process, considering the low Mako-content in his veins. Speaking of that, did I read that chart right?"

Sephiroth re-opened the file and removed it. He passed it to Angeal. Angeal squinted at it.

"Yeah, I did. Is it just my paranoia, or do you find it weird that he had such an abnormal reaction?"

"I noticed that as well. I don't know how to react to it," he turned it over and over in his hands, the tiny numbers turning into a meaningless pattern as his unfocused, "Harry is a mystery. I'm anticipating a more detailed report from the Turks in a week's time. They've sent an operative to Kalm to see if anything matches up, and, of course, to hunt around for suspicious activity."

Angeal smiled and stood, "Something tells me that there will be mention of disappearing at odd hours and coming back smelling like monster blood." 

Sephiroth smirked, "Something like that. Thanks for telling me about his accent. I'll alert the Turks to examine his educational background."

"That sounds like a plan. Hey, do you want to come over tonight? I feel like we haven't been social in a while."

Not since you've started dating Penelope, Sephiroth mentally rebuked him. Outwardly he smiled and nodded, "That would be nice. I'll see you later."

"Okay."

The door shut and Sephiroth pulled Harry's profile to him again. Instead of reviewing the information, he turned to the front page and unclipped the regulation photograph taken after basic training. Harry had his hair swept back from his forehead neatly, revealing a small scar shaped like a zigzag in the center of his forehead. It was a black and white photograph, which he regretted. He wanted to see some evidence of the color Harry's eyes had been before his Mako injection.

His eyes moved from his scar to his nose, and down his nose to his lips. What was it about them that captivated him? He didn't chew them or lick them convulsively. He didn't have to. They were beautiful like the rest of his face. There was nothing angular about his face, nor did he have the pretty-boy elegance of the few attractive non-SOLDIERS Sephiroth had met. He was masculine and so healthy.

Sephiroth was surprised when he realized that Harry reminded him of Simone, and vice versa. That reminded him of his still-unresolved children. What was he going to do about them?

He sighed. What _could _he do about them?

~000~

Angeal hummed as he prepared his usual Wednesday night dinner, only this time enough for two. He felt a pang when he realized that he would never have to make enough for three again. Sure, he would have two guests, but none of them would ever have the same sensibilities about food presentation Genesis did.

He slammed his fist down on the counter. It was a pointless gesture and used very little strength, but it released some of the tension he was feeling.

He tried to think about something else. He thought about Zack. Zack was a very gifted young man. Angeal hadn't had a protégé in almost two years, and he'd forgotten how much he enjoyed working one-on-one with someone. It was more than that with Zack, though. Zack had a rare enthusiasm for swordplay, and his enthusiasm was infectious. Angeal found himself just as reluctant to stop for the night as Zack, even when his protégé was soaked with sweat and shaking.

He smiled and cracked an egg over Sephiroth's portion. His friend was looking a little wan, and the extra protein would perk him up.

His thoughts moved to Harry. He closed his eyes. He hadn't meant to admit to Sephiroth, in full hearing of the monitoring devices, that he found Harry near irresistible. The worst of it was that he wasn't even sure why he was so attracted to him. Maybe it was the novelty of finding someone so naturally healthy and strong in these modern times. Maybe it was that Harry was beautiful, or that super-soft voice of his.

He loved Harry's real accent.

The food sizzled and he snapped out of it, hurriedly scooping the unimaginative mixture of meat, potatoes, and assorted vegetables onto two separate plates. Hojo didn't even bother to name the SOLDIER meals. They were numbered by day of the week and time of consumption. This, for example, was named 4.3, because it was eaten on the fourth day of the week for dinner.

Like clockwork, Sephiroth knocked on the door. Angeal left it unlocked for him. The knock was more of a 'please be decent' warning.

Sephiroth helped him set the table, poured them each a glass of water for afterwards, and sat. They didn't jump into conversation. Despite Angeal's words in the office earlier, things had been a little awkward between them since their grief-motivated night of passion. It had been pleasurable for both of them, and helped ease the loss of Genesis in a way Angeal didn't quite understand. But regardless of why it happened, it had happened. And now they had sex between them, and neither wanted to think about it. It was very hard for Angeal not to think about it, especially considering that every time he saw Sephiroth he remembered that he'd technically been unfaithful to Penelope, and felt no need to tell her. It was dishonorable of him, but lately he wasn't so sure about things with Penelope. She was a good woman, very smart, very capable, and he was extremely attracted to her physically. There was a way she carried herself, and her shock of ultra-short blonde hair just…turned him on.

They finished dinner without speaking, and Sephiroth hesitated. Angeal realized he didn't know if it was safe for them to be alone together again.

He laughed. It was inappropriate and disrespectful, but he laughed. He laughed loud and Sephiroth actually joined in. Relief broke over them and Sephiroth clapped him on the back. Angeal threw his arms around him. Sephiroth wasn't one for physical affection (outside the obvious), but he returned the embrace.

"Do you want to watch the news? I feel like doing something mind-numbing."

Sephiroth gave him a rare grin, "That sounds fantastic. Oh, I forgot; thanks for the extra egg on my dinner."

Angeal smiled and sat, "No problem, my friend. I won't tell Hojo if you won't."

Much later that night as they were parting ways, Angeal said as an afterthought,

"Oh, I've tricked Harry into some hand-to-hand with me. I can let you know when and where in case you'd like to observe."

"Thank you, I would."

They smiled at each other and Sephiroth left to sleep in his own bed. For a wild moment he thought about going out and finding somebody to spend the night with, but decided against it. He'd rather spend tonight alone with his thoughts.

~000~

Considering that it was the primary source of power before the rise of ShinRa, there was surprisingly little information available about electricity. Harry covered all of it in the two hours after dinner and before curfew, reading feverishly in the library.

He tried searching their version of the Internet, and came up with one vital fact. The towers were still fully-functional. They were simply turned off, and obviously some attempts had been made by nature to reclaim them.

An idea began to form. He was careful not to jump on it, but rather wait for it to grow flesh and grow to fruition before he considered it.

He was in Materia class fretting about his first hand to hand session with Angeal that night when it blossomed. He still hadn't told Zack about Angeal's insistence on training him. It wasn't that he hadn't had plenty of oppurtunities to do so. Since his accident Zack stuck to his side like glue. There wasn't a crack in his cheerful demeanor, but Harry wasn't stupid. He knew that his brush with death had frightened his friend. It was the price he paid for being Zack's hero; proof of his mortality affected his friend so much more.

The idea distracted him. He opened his notepaper to a fresh page and began to scribble it down before he could forget. First, he needed to go to Kalm and reestablish contact with the environmental terrorists there.

But before that he had to fight with Angeal, and before that he needed to find some way to tell Zack.

The opportunity came at dinner. Zack sat beside him and surreptitiously scooped some of his rations onto Harry's plate. Harry tried to make him take them back, but Zack refused. He insisted that Harry needed the protein more than he did to help rebuild his muscles. Harry didn't want to argue with him, so he accepted the gift. Beneath the table he squeezed Zack's knee. He felt déjà vu, remembering doing the same to Rude on his birthday in that seedy bar. It'd been a month since he'd seen Rude. Rude was in Mideel doing something he wasn't allowed to talk about. He still didn't know about Harry's accident, and Harry didn't want to tell him.

Rude was all for letting Harry be independent and label-free, but he was a natural protector (a fact that made his job designation humorous), and it would hurt him to know that Harry almost died when he was too far away to do anything but worry.

"So what are you doing tonight?"

Harry bit his lip and went for it, "I'm sparring with Angeal, actually."

Zack's chewing slowed. It was minute, but he caught it. His chest seized and he tried to squeeze Zack's knee again, only to find that it'd inexplicably moved out of reach. It was too casual a move for him to take it too seriously, but he didn't think it was unintentional.

"Oh. I didn't know you had officially met."

"He came and visited me in physical therapy. I guess he found out that I was injured fighting monsters and wanted to make sure it wouldn't happen again. He said it was sparring or he would report me," Harry paused and watched Zack for a reaction. Zack was a blank, friendly slate. This was not going well, "Zack I swear I'm not trying to horn in on your mentor. You _know _how many mentor offers I turned down! I'm already having problems fitting in with the others. I can't afford to be singled out. It was this or a mark on my record."

"I understand," Zack's voice was strained, "its cool. Hey, I'm not hungry anymore. I'm going to go. I'll see you later."

"…Okay. Are you alright? Does your stomach hurt?"

"No, I'm just much more tired than I thought. You know that feeling you get when your stomach is too sore to eat?"

Harry nodded. Zack smiled wanly and left.

Things were definitely not cool, and there was nothing Harry could do about it. At least Zack believed his story about meeting in physical therapy. Zack knew Angeal as his super-manly and super-heterosexual father figure. He did not need to know that Harry slept with him.

~000~

Penelope frowned at her computer screen. She was in Kalm researching a suspicious soldier. She had gone digging in the private lives of others many times, and she'd learned all kinds of dirty secrets she could have lived without. If there was one thing her job taught her, it was that everybody was hiding something, even if it was just an addiction to reality TV.

But this guy? There was nothing. Not even a DUI. His name was Harry Potter and he grew up with his aunt in a shady neighborhood, but there was no mention of having hung around with the bad kids in his high school records. He didn't smoke, didn't drink excessively. He was homosexual, but he didn't seem to have any particularly out there deviancies. He just slept with men, plain and simple.

There was no indication that he was the kind of kid that would grow up to go fighting monsters in the Midgar desert in his spare time. He didn't even fight with kids in kindergarten. No, he was always polite, always on time, never skipped class, never cut in line.

She rubbed her eyebrows with a groan. It was two in the morning and she had been reading old school files since five. She'd missed dinner for the most boring reading material known to man. There were still some files to check, but she was positive they would contain nothing special.

It would seem that the General was going to be disappointed. She clicked open the folders again and skimmed them for lack of anything else to do.

And then she noticed it. The handwriting samples on the reports from his school and the reports from his days as a clerk were the same. She checked again, straightening. There were four different handwriting styles, and they were randomly dispersed among the folders. Reports meant to have been written by the same person were written in several different handwriting styles.

They were forgeries. They were damn good forgeries, the best she'd ever seen in and out of ShinRa, but forgeries nonetheless.

She called Tseng, clicking 'print'.

~000~

End Chapter 14

This chapter had no business taking so long to write considering the length and content. Whatever. I hope this is okay!


	15. Chapter 15

~000~

**Vivified**

~000~ 

Chapter Fifteen

~000~

Angeal knocked on the doorframe of Sephiroth's office. Sephiroth looked up in question.

"Hey, I just wanted to let you know that I'm off to spar with Harry now in case you wanted to watch."

"I do," Sephiroth stood and shrugged into his jacket. He swept his hair over one shoulder and followed Angeal to the elevators. "Did you read the message I sent you?"

Angeal punched the 'down' button, "The one about Harry's documents being forged? Yeah. I'm trying to think of a way to get information out of him, but short of drugging him nothing comes to mind. He's good at deflection, damn him."

"That reminds me…"

The elevator arrived. Three businessmen were inside of it, but when they saw Sephiroth standing there they vacated it. Sephiroth secretly hated it when people did that. What were they so afraid of? He wasn't even armed. Was he really that scary? He knew logically that it was a gesture of respect, but he'd had enough of being singled out for special treatment. Sometimes he just wanted to blend in.

They stepped inside.

"What are you reminded of?" Angeal prodded, leaning back and folding his arms.

"Oh. In your conversation with him when his accent returned, did he say anything else you found unusual?"

Angeal snapped his fingers, "Magic! He said something about losing the fight because he forgot his magic. I completely forgot about it until now. At the time I must have thought it was just nonsense. Do you think he really does have access to magic?"

"I didn't find anything in his bag."

"His bag?"

Angeal coughed, looking mildly uncomfortable, "After our conversation I got suspicious. I had Zack, my protégé, bring Harry's bag of belongings to me. I searched it thoroughly and found nothing unusual. No photographs or mementos either. Only clothing and textbooks."

"Isn't that unusual in and of itself?" Sephiroth asked, stepping out as their elevator landed.

"I thought about that, but maybe not. He has no family and he wasn't close with what he did have, so he wouldn't carry photographs of them. And if there is any truth to what he told me about leaving Kalm for Wutai to find meaning, he wasn't invested in his community. He wouldn't have left like that if he had close friends."

"I see the logic in that. I still find it unbelievable that someone like this has managed to be in my army for almost a year without my noticing anything unusual."

Angeal smiled and opened the door to the training room he used with Zack. Harry wasn't due to arrive for another half an hour. "Hey, I'm the idiot that got distracted at the Crater. I knew something wasn't right then, but I was more interested in sleeping with him than figuring him out."

Sephiroth took a seat against the wall and set to work on a small tangle in his hair. He said nothing. Angeal began to warm up.

"Should I send the Turks to Wutai to see what they can find there?" Sephiroth asked after a while.

"Good idea. We should send them to the Crater as well and see if they know anything."

Sephiroth abandoned his hair and pulled out his PHS. He began typing a message to Tseng detailing forays into Harry's location and possible magic use. When he'd finished he pulled a basic Materia out of his pocket. He was planning to work on mastering it in the desert that night, but now he had a better idea.

"Catch."

Angeal turned and caught it.

"For Harry. See how he reacts."

"Right."

Sephiroth stood, "I'm going to conceal myself in the observation deck. I won't be able to see as much, but I don't want to alarm him so soon."

Angeal nodded and let him go.

The training rooms were interconnected and shared a communal shower. There were four observation decks, one on each side of the outer walls. They were usually used during the hand-to-hand aspect of the SOLDIER exams, but sometimes a mentor would use it to observe his pupils or to monitor two soldiers that didn't necessarily get along to ensure that they didn't kill each other or do too much damage.

He settled in to wait. He still had a few minutes before he could expect Harry's arrival. In the mean time Tseng responded to his message. He messaged him back, frowning, with Harry's alleged life story. He thought again about Angeal's affair with Harry. Perhaps it was for the best that he was observing their fight. This way Angeal would have more self-control, knowing that he wasn't actually alone with Harry.

That stabbing feeling he had when he thought about them together was jealousy. He'd made his peace with that. But what was he supposed to do about it? Harry was his inferior and he had no business crossing that line. He was responsible for the well-being of his army, and that meant keeping his personal life out of it.

In spite of his noble intentions, when the door opened and Harry stepped through, his heart stood still.

He had several theories about why Harry had such a strong effect on him. One was that, like his attraction to Simone, there was something primal inside of him that needed a healthy partner. He also thought that it could have something to do with Harry as a person. Harry was physically attractive to him, but he also liked the way he could read his face so easily. He liked the way he smelled, and he wanted desperately to know more about him. He had the paltry (and forged) information about him memorized. It wasn't enough. He wanted to know him.

Angeal said something to him and Harry laughed. Sephiroth couldn't hear anything. He wished he could. It hadn't occurred to him that he would want to eavesdrop.

Harry warmed up and Angeal pretended to as well. Harry's stretches were standard ShinRa movements. His flexibility appeared to be somewhat above average. Sephiroth began drafting notes on his PHS that he would email to his computer for later revising.

He jotted down 'Possibility of hypermobility syndrome'.

They circled one another, still talking. Sephiroth made a half-hearted effort to read their lips before deciding that it was too much of a distraction. They held wooden practice swords in the ready position as they circled. Each waited for the other to make the first move.

Harry struck and then darted back so quick Angeal had to over-extend to retaliate. Sephiroth read a compliment on his lips. Harry smiled shyly.

They sparred for an hour. They had agreed to half of that so they wouldn't over-strain Harry's tender shoulder, but Harry said at the halfway mark that he felt fine. Sephiroth was glad that they decided to continue on. He was mesmerized by the way Harry moved and didn't want them to stop. He had already noted that he should acquire the security feed for examination.

Harry's sharp sweeping motions belied him as a self-taught swordsman. He didn't fight in any of the specific styles or 'schools' of swordsmanship. His movements were almost jerky, but graceful. He never once lost his balance, an unusual feat for a first-year soldier. And the most surprisingly thing of all was that Angeal only managed to land less than ten hits on him during their entire hour.

Angeal was a First Class SOLDIER, and a Commander. He, along with Genesis and Sephiroth, were among the first to be genetically altered with Mako. Their doses were much higher. When pressed, Angeal could sprout _wings _and fly. And yet he was unable to catch a simple soldier with a blunt wooden sword.

Sephiroth couldn't believe his eyes. It wasn't that Harry could float or teleport, but he seemed to. He was never where you expected him to be, and so quick! Angeal sported a bruise on his chin from a sharp smack of the toy sword.

Angeal clapped him on the back and Harry grinned at him. The grin fell away when Angeal took something out of his pocket and held it up for him to see. It was the Materia Sephiroth gave him. Angeal was saying something. Harry shook his head. Angeal insisted, and Harry let the Materia be forced into his hand.

He held it awkwardly at first, and then began to roll it between his palms casually as Angeal continued to talk. Harry bit his lip, looking down. He mumbled something, and Angeal raised his eyebrows. Sephiroth would've killed a man to know what they were saying.

Something went 'boom'. Harry dropped the Materia, and Sephiroth squinted through the rising cloud of smoke, trying to see what happened. When it cleared Harry was clutching his face, or perhaps just his eyes, and Angeal was hovering trying to see what was wrong. Harry took his hands away to reveal bright green tear tracks down his cheeks. The Mako was bleeding away.

Sephiroth had never seen anything like it. Harry appeared to be in pain. Angeal took him by the arm and guided him out the door. Just before they disappeared from sight Sephiroth saw him take something out his pocket.

Sephiroth's PHS rang.

"Hey, uh, Harry's had some kind of accident and he doesn't feel so good. I'm taking him to the medics. I'll come over as soon as I'm done to talk, okay?"

"I will see you then."

Angeal hung up. Sephiroth sent the message of notes to himself and then pocketed the device. He lingered in the hallway, unsure of what to do. He wasn't sure he wanted to be confined in his apartment just now. He ached to follow them to the hospital and find out if Harry was going to be alright.

He gnawed his lip almost to the point of drawing blood and then set off for his apartment.

~00~

Harry was very uncomfortable. He was strapped to a sort of dentist's chair. There was tape holding his eyes open, and metal instruments encircled them. He could feel the body heat of the seven people in white coats crowded around him.

As soon as the staff at the hospital determined that he wasn't actually injured, he was relayed to the laboratories. An aide pounced on him and before he knew what was going on he was strapped to this chair.

He was utterly convinced that they were going to remove his eyes from their sockets for science.

The last thing he expected was a further complication with his magic and Mako. He thought he was over the worst of it, that all he would have to worry about was itching and possibly burning in his veins. He didn't expect a casual flick of his magic to send it pulsing out of his body.

From listening to the scientists he'd gathered that there was nothing for it. Something inside of him was incompatible with Mako. He felt real dread when they began discussing the best way to determine what it was. Apparently he was the very first person to have this sort of incompatibility. They were worried that it was a new genetic mutation that would soon begin cropping up in more and more recruits.

He understood their concern, he really did. If others had his incompatibility, the SOLDIER Program would collapse. But he also knew that he was the only person on the Planet with this incompatibility, unless there were other aliens he didn't know about. He couldn't say that, of course, and he was genuinely frightened that more in-depth analysis of his blood and physiognomy would result in the revelation of something abnormal that would give him away.

The clamps were removed from his eyes and the tape casually jerked off. He blinked up at the scientists. Only one of them was actually looking at him. His wide brown eyes took in Harry's un-tinted eye color and asked him if it'd hurt when the Mako escaped. Harry nodded. The scientist pursed his lips and wrote this down.

Harry was unstrapped and told to report back to the laboratories in three days, when they'd finished analyzing their data and come up with some tests to run.

That was unacceptable. One way or another, he needed to find a way to get out of it.

His mind was whirling with possibilities when he pushed open the door to his barracks. He immediately knew that something was wrong. His eyes were throbbing and hazy, but he could see that Zack was slouched on his bed, and that he wasn't happy.

For once everyone else was in the barracks, probably because of the proximity to curfew. They were also paying very close attention to him. Ostensibly they were engaged in card games, sleeping, or just chatting with friends, but they were watching him out of the corners of their eyes or taking glances.

He pushed his shoulders back and went to his bunk. He sat beside Zack and reached out to touch him, concern on his lips. Zack pulled his legs to his chest, out of reach.

"Zack, are you okay?"

Zack curled his lip and muttered something. Harry didn't catch it and said so.

"I said you never let me have anything for myself!"

"What are you talking about?"

Zack got off the bunk and stumbled a little. He grabbed hold of the next bunk to keep his balance. He was disheveled and he smelled like alcohol. Harry sighed.

"Zack, don't be like this. I know you're upset about Angeal, but its totally okay, I promise. I told him that I only want to do three sessions, and he agreed. So in no time you'll have him back to yourself."

Zack looked like he was going to cry.

"You don't get it…" he whispered. Harry strained to hear him. "You don't get it. I _know."_

"Know what?" Harry's entire head was throbbing from his magic reclaiming space previously occupied by Mako. His entire body ached from overdoing it with Angeal, and he was tired from a long day of training and classes. He didn't want to have an argument, and he definitely didn't want to have an argument in front of everyone else in the barracks.

"Damn it, I know that you slept with him!"

Harry was stunned. He could say nothing. Zack sniffed and sat across from him.

"Did you think I was blind? I went to visit you when you were in the hospital. I skipped class so I could be there when you would have more energy, and what do I see? I see my mentor, _my mentor, _sitting with you and looking so fucking upset I can't stand it. And it was so obvious from the way he was talking to you, sitting so close and talking the way he was. Fuck, Harry, why didn't you say something? I've been waiting and waiting for you to tell me, but you never did. You lied."

The tirade ended, but not for good. Zack took a long drink of water from his bottle and shoved it back into the pocket of his bunk.

"What kind of friend are you? I'm always the one making time for you, accommodating _you. _I like you and I thought that you were a good person, but I guess not. I must be wrong about you, because why else would you keep something like this from me? You know how much Angeal means to me."

Harry had never thought that he was being a bad friend, but Zack was right. Harry wasn't used to making and maintaining new friends. He was used to Ron and Hermione, George and Neville. People that'd known him since he was a little kid and gone through war with him. People that knew all about his moods and understood why he needed to be alone sometimes. Zack wasn't any of these things. Zack was just a talented kid from Gongaga that wanted to be his friend.

Harry swelled with emotion. He reached out for Zack.

"God, I'm so sorry. Zack, I've been known to do this before. I'm so stupid, I just don't _think _sometimes."

Zack didn't move. Harry let his arms drop. He stubbornly held onto the belief that he could make this right. He just wished everyone wasn't watching.

"Zack, I didn't tell you about Angeal and me because I didn't want to freak you out. You're straight, and as far as you knew Angeal was too. I didn't want to make things weird between you by telling you that we had a past."

"I don't want to talk about this anymore," Zack muttered, squatting to dig under the bunk by Harry's feet for his things. He began to change into his pajamas. Harry parted his lips to speak but bit the words back when he saw a streak of salt water on Zack's tan cheek. He hated to know that he was responsible for it.

Zack crawled into his bunk in time for the lights to go out. Harry sighed and began to get undressed in the dark. Someone bumped him roughly in the dark, causing him to smack his head against the bed-frame. He said nothing, only got ready as quickly as possible before getting into bed.

His body hurt, and now his heart did too.

~000~

He spent the next day torn between finding a way to get through to Zack, who was stonewalling him, and a way to get out of his laboratory visit. He also needed to get to Kalm as soon as possible. Every day he waited was another day closer to the end of this world.

It was a sobering thought, and it soon overwhelmed his intentions regarding Zack. He spent his study period re-evaluating all his information on electricity instead of studying for his test on Wutain Ethics.

Reno attempted to start a whispered conversation about going down to Midgar that weekend, but Harry couldn't concentrate and told him he'd think about it. He wasn't sure that he would still be in Midgar that weekend, if all went well.

All he had to do was find a way to get put on suspension. He could take a slug at a sergeant, but he _liked _his sergeants, even the nasty ones. There was something about impersonal male authority that made him not want to fuck with it.

An opportunity was handed to him, gift-wrapped, that night. He returned to the barracks sweaty and exhilarated from a long run on the track. He'd needed the extra endorphins to lift his spirits. Things were starting to look bleak.

He intended to take a shower and fall into bed. What he found waiting for him was the entire squad minus Zack, who was still in a training session with Angeal. He raised his eyebrows as he walked to his bunk.

"Is something going on?"

"Yeah." It was Bobby, a shaven-headed punk from the Slums. He was a trouble-maker and considered the unofficial leader of the squad because he once killed a man in a knife fight. Harry never tried to assert himself, preferring to exist as a satellite of the squad rather than a member of it. He sighed.

"Okay, what did I do, Bobby?"

"You fucked Zack's mentor."

Harry groaned, "One, that was a long ago. Two, that is none of your business. That's between Zack and I. Good night."

He turned to get undressed. Someone grabbed his shoulder and spun him back around. A fist came flying at his face. He ducked and it smashed into the bed frame. Bobby howled, grabbing his hand. Blood was spurting from it, and Harry could see white bone sticking out.

Instead of acting as a deterrent, the sight of blood inflamed the others. They came at him all at once. Harry fended them off as best as he could, but there were a lot of them and he was terrified that he'd hurt them. He was already exhausted from his run, and quickly becoming more so as the rain of fists and booted feet didn't abate.

He swung out with his full strength on instinct when someone got too close, and the boy, Charlie, went down like a sack of potatoes. Harry spared a thought of concern but was soon distracted by a pair of hands taking hold of his throat. He grunted and grabbed his assailant by the hair, tearing his from him. The guy went flying, leaving Harry with a handful of brown hair and blood.

This was getting ugly. He spun and punched someone sneaking behind him in the stomach. There was a loud crack as he broke their ribs. He noticed the knife in his hands and knew on an animal level that he had done what was right to defend his life against a legitimate threat.

Speaking of threats, where were the sergeants? The barracks were monitored. Someone in security would have noticed the fight by now and alerted the sergeants that there was an incident, especially one involving this many participants.

He was forced to retreat from the seven remaining to the door, where he was pinned in place. He kicked one of them in the head, and they fell. A pool of blood formed around their head where he had broken the skin and possibly fractured their skull.

The door behind him moved inwards. Harry toppled forward onto Lars. The door burst open and slammed against the wall. Two sergeants and a lieutenant stood there, heaving from pushing the door in. they stared at the chaos in the room in speechless wonder.

Bobby was curled in the fetal position, clutching his wrist and moaning. Three soldiers lay in various states of consciousness on the floor, and many more were bleeding or forming large purple bruises on their faces.

Amazingly, Harry Potter, the soldier described as the victim by the security guards, was the least injured. A nasty cut was forming on his cheek and he was favoring one leg over the other, but he still had all of his teeth.

The room was filled with sounds of heaving breaths and moans from the fallen.

"Potter, come with us. The rest of you stay here and wait for medical assistance!"

Those that were able saluted, and Harry followed his superiors into the hall. There was an awkward silence when the superiors realized they weren't sure what to do with Harry. He was the one the others ganged up on, but he was also responsible for seriously injuring his fellow soldiers. They were supposed to remove him for his own protection, but now it appeared that they needed to remove him for the protection of the others.

They elected that the lieutenant should take him to a nurse to get his cut looked at while the others attended to those remaining in the barracks.

Harry was on pins and needles during his stint in the hospital; they only grew worse when he overheard that he was supposed to be taken to a holding cell for disciplinary consideration. He felt like he'd swallowed a rock when he overheard in the next conversation that two of his assailants were now in intensive care, and that a third soldier had died of head trauma.

He hadn't meant to kill anyone.

~000~

End Chapter 15

In the interest of my self esteem and frequent updates, chapters are going to be a little shorter from now on. Okay? Awesome.


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